The swell of smartphones and the growing hoards of people accessing the Internet from them should be ignored at the savvy marketer’s peril. Gone are the days when mobile marketing was only about push activity via SMS – always a problem for B2B marketers anyway, with wrenching mobile numbers out of prospects an often near impossible task.
Nowadays, smartphone users are willingly accessing emails, viewing websites and downloading applications from their devices. And the launch of the iPad proves even more so that there is an appetite for Internet on the go.
According to a recent IAB/ PWC mobile ad spend study, the mobile market grew by more than 30 per cent last year – despite the advertising market as a whole falling by 12.6 per cent in value. At the moment mobile spend accounts for just one per cent of overall digital spend, but with more and more brands looking at ways to infiltrate the mobile market, this figure will rise. Anil Pillai, MD of marketing agency LBI, says that clients including BT, Lloyds and E.On all have plans to make mobile marketing a part of their marketing mix – and this is just the tip of the iceberg.
“The financial services sector as a whole is particularly interested in mobile marketing,” Pillai says, “because it can drive a subject to everything from trading platforms to equities investment.” LBI is working on the launch of four B2B mobile marketing campaigns at the moment – two to launch later this year and another two to launch at the beginning of 2011. “These brands are all looking at the innovative use of technology to differentiate themselves from the competition,” Pillai adds.
Connecting clients
Mobile marketing can take on several forms, from giving prospects a mobile optimised website to access, to mobile versions of opt-in newsletters and developing bespoke apps for users.
“Some of the first and most obvious applications for this technology are one-to-one sales demos at trade shows,” says Jon Philips, senior digital strategy consultant at Rufus Leonard. “Location-based services also have great potential from an acquisition perspective. The power of adding location-based applications to mobile devices for B2B is that it helps foster relationships offline, which by nature is a core element of the decision-making process within businesses.”
Philips cites Hoovers (a business information provider and part of D&B), which has developed an app that provides sales and business development professionals access to location-based business information on millions of companies in the US and Canada in real-time, viewable by map or list. Based on the data provided, users can quickly and easily place a phone call to the company, visit the company’s website and even find local competitors. Sales staff can access key data using the app on any business in close proximity – annual turnover, key contacts, names etc – and quickly determine whether or not it’s a lead worth pursuing.
“Ultimately, the real value of mobile applications within ongoing customer service for B2B clients is that it can solve problems and resolve issues speedily, on the go and at the client’s convenience, which from a relationship-strengthening perspective, is critical. Mobile apps have immense potential to keep B2B organisations and their communities of clients connected at all times and wherever in the world they happen to be,” comments Philips.
App opportunities
Most people still think of apps as a consumer product, made for the iPhone. But the technology is there to be exploited by B2B marketers too.
“Apps allow brands to go beyond ‘push’ messaging and deliver a more personalised connection with the customer, but they must deliver added value or engaging content to ensure their success,” says Liane Grimshaw, managing partner at Amaze. She adds, “Most apps create a buzz or awareness around a brand, or they deliver useful information, such as product demonstrations or personalised information, adding value and forging deeper customer relationships. It is this second area that is more relevant to B2B brands.”
According to Robert Elding, marketing director at Yudu, which produces apps for publishing clients, apps can cost anywhere from between £25,000 and £100,000 to develop if you’re going to hire an external specialist to develop it for you. It’s an expensive job, so you want to be sure that you’re going down the right route in developing one in the first place. So, how do you decide?
“A simple way of working out a mobile strategy would be to map the customer journey and work out all the touch points along that route where mobile could be used to extend or enhance existing communications. Only then should you decide which mobile technology would be most appropriate,” advises Paul Berney, managing director for EMEA and chief marketing officer of the Mobile Marketing Association. “Starting out with a mindset that says ‘we need an app’ is a common mistake. That said, apps have opened up tremendous opportunities for marketers to engage with their customers. If B2B brands are clear on the need for an app, then they should be looking at utility-based apps that allow their customers a degree of self service, for example delivery tracking or part number look-up while on the move.”
“The fundamental difference between a B2C end user and a B2B one is that the (consumer) has an app because they like it, a B2B user has an app because they need it,” adds Tim Satchell, commercial director at InfoMedia Services.
To give an example of a B2B app in practice, Salesforce has developed an iPhone app that connects to a business’ own hosted version of Salesforce, enabling them to create new leads, log calls and monitor conversions.
iPad means business
The iPad looks set to accelerate the use of apps even more. According to recent stats from TechCrunch, web browsing on an iPad rose from 0.4 per cent to 4.51 per cent in the space of 30 days. The iPad’s high price tag means that currently, it is typically attracting high earners (they’re already a common sight on commuter trains in and around London as users tap away on them), and Christmas-time purchasing is expected to rapidly accelerate sales. It’s inevitable that the iPad will increase in popularity as the price eventually comes down, and rival tablet devices from the likes of Samsung, Toshiba and Acre are already snapping at its heels.
“Our research shows that while the iPhone is dominated by entertainment and gaming apps, with a relatively small percentage of apps addressing business needs, the iPad offers a far larger proportion of apps that focus on user productivity as their core function, indicating how the divergence in the use of these differing mobile devices is evolving,” comments Justin Copplestone, creative director of innovations at digital marketing agency Story Worldwide.
Distribution channels
Yudu was quick to realise the power of the mobile app. When the launch of the iPad was announced earlier this year it already had a team on standby ready to get to work on creating a self-publishing solution. Yudu allows anyone to publish magazines and other documents online – and now directly to people’s iPads too. Customers purchase their own branded app for their title, Yudu then submits the app for approval by Apple. Once approved, every time customers publish a digital edition, they can also create an iPad edition and publish to their app. Readers with iPhones or iPads are then notified when each new publication is available – either to buy or for free depending on the model a business chooses.
“It’s very attractive for a lot of publishers and B2B customers out there because it’s a way of creating your own distribution channel in effect. Once you have your app, you can send any information you want to your subscribers. It’s a very powerful tool,” says Elding.
Elding estimates that there are currently around 5000 iPad apps, compared to about 230,000 iPhone apps in the market. “We are seeing some remarkable numbers in terms of downloads – partly because there isn’t a great deal of content up there [for us to compete with] at the moment.”
Customised content
Mobile marketing isn’t just about the creation of apps. Brands are increasingly finding that people are accessing their websites on the go, which is why it’s becoming crucial to have a website that is tailored specifically for mobile browsing. Most important to remember, says Berney, is that you should not just reformat what viewers can access on a PC. “It’s about providing concise, timely and relevant information. People simply don’t engage with content in the same way on the mobile device, and it is therefore not a like-for-like experience,” he says.
Some of the basics to consider when adapting content for mobile access include making sure that your site is low resolution. Flash is also a no-no. “Mobile sites must offer fast access, simple navigation and focus on the facts. They must meet and fulfill mobile user requirements – there is no expectation of visual richness, just limited images that load quickly,” advises Grimshaw.
The IAB, which uses its mobile website as a kind of CRM tool to promote things such as upcoming events, includes simple information that visitors might want to access on the go, such as a ‘click-to-call’ button. It also puts out a mobile version of its newsletter for those who have opted in.
As Jon Mew, the IAB’s head of mobile explains, it’s taken around a year to build a database of mobile phone numbers. “We do it in a mixture of ways, we capture numbers at events and on our site – when people register with us we optionally ask them to provide their mobile number.” The IAB sends out an SMS with a link to a mobile optimised version of the newsletter. Mew says that around 50 per cent of registered users are now opting into the IAB’s mobile content.
A marketing evolution?
Advances in mobile technology have been rapid over the past few years, but the jury remains out as to whether mobile browsing will ultimately change the way we access the Internet in the future. Most seem to think that technology still has a way to go before web accessing via mobile devices will be fully embraced in the B2B arena.
“Until we get a unified application experience across the fragmented range of platforms, mobile websites will be the medium-term future,” says Si Crowhurst, business development director at mobile agency We Love Mobile – with Grimshaw adding that battery life issues prevent ‘unlimited’ browsing and use of applications. Still, there is a definitive market ready and waiting to be tapped into by the forward-thinking B2B marketer.
