Mobile Is Key To Cross-Media Marketing Strategy

MediaPost's OnLineMediaDaily by Laurie Sullivan, Nov 7, 2012, 12:42 PM Forrester Research has released a method for benchmarking a company's "mobile maturity," as campaign budgets continue to rise. The guidelines are intended to help marketers understand different growth stages, and determine budgets to create a cross-media strategy and road map. Advertisers will spend $77 billion on interactive marketing by 2016, similar to the amount today spent on television, Forrester estimates. Search marketing, display advertising, mobile marketing, email marketing, and social media will comprise 26% of all advertising spend as marketers embed more media in the mix. "The Score Your Mobile Marketing Maturity" report describes three processes: Organization, Planning and Execution, and Measurement. Each section lists a series of questions, such as "How does your organization view the importance of mobile marketing," along with possible answers like "Mobile marketing is the connective tissue between online and offline channels and is key to any marketing campaign." About half of all companies have some type of mobile marketing strategy. While the personal nature of the device creates a tighter bond between brand and consumer, no event mobile ad campaign can live in a silo. Tagga Media confirmed that theory during a recent campaign with adidas. The company, which specializes in mobile marketing and advertising strategies, developed a cross-channel campaign in partnership with adidas SLD (Sports Licensed Division), according to Amielle Lake, Tagga founder and CRO, which views mobile as the backbone to cross-channel strategies. The campaign aimed to raise awareness and sales of adidas college football attire through Kohl's Web sites in Tennessee, Wisconsin, Nebraska and Michigan. The co-branded initiative created a cloud-based, cross-channel campaign that increased sales between 30% and 100% across each of four markets. In 21 days, the campaign generated more than 13,000 entries and leads across all four markets. For each entry, consumers entered their name, phone number, mail and email address. About 1,968 were completed via SMS. It also prompted 49,000 page views across all four sites in the four markets. The cross-channel campaign began on Aug 24 and ended Sept. 15. Consumers entered the sweepstakes online via a branded landing page or in Kohl's department stores by texting a keyword to a short code and completing the entry form on a branded mobile optimized page. Once the sweepstakes entry form was completed, customers were presented with a success page that included a link to the Kohl's e-commerce store. Customers could purchase adidas college football merchandise directly from their mobile or desktop devices. Winners received prizes ranging from college football team merchandise to game tickets.