Many brands and marketers are struggling right now with how to reach their target consumers through the mobile devices they keep within four feet of themselves 24-hours a day and are staring at constantly. “Mobile is arguably the closest you can get to the consumer.  There is no other device that is as personal (everybody has their own phone), as pervasive (is with you all of the time), and provides the opportunity for proximity.”

Image source: Shutterstock

We’ve heard and talked about mobile-friendly designs, mobile-first designs and responsive website design. But all of these approaches focus on the design and the technology. What if we started thinking about mobile as a behavior and treating the content delivery for the “moment” that it is accessed rather than delivering all the brand content that one would normally find when accessing a brand website? With the understanding that mobile internet access will surpass desktop internet access by 2014, dealing with mobility and consumers is something marketers can’t ignore.

A recent study found that:

“the single greatest contributor to marketing performance (ignoring creative) was: 1) aligning the media mix for today’s consumer’s media habits, and 2) being the innovator / early adopter of new media. It’s fairly simple. In a world of diminishing returns, the brand that invests early in understanding the new channel reaps disproportionate advantages.”

If we are thinking about mobile behavior, let’s first cover how people use their smartphones:

  • Text messages, with a response time of two minutes.
  • Social media, with a response time of eight to nine minutes.
  • Searching the web for information and to settle “bar bets” or similar. 81% of mobile searches are driven by convenience.
  • Email, with a response time of two hours.
  • As a phone to make actual phone calls.

Here are some things to consider when approaching the creation of mobile moments for your target consumers:

Social
More than 70% of social media is accessed via smartphone, so links shared through social media must be mobile-friendly. Content shared on social should be short and sharp, no more than two sentences. Simple visual posts always spur more engagement and make sure the images/videos are not large files that take too long to download on a mobile device; people will abandon before it completes the load if it is too slow.

Search
People are using their smartphones to search for anything and everything online. And Google is constantly refining their search algorithm to deliver better results to their searchers. Which means they are detecting whether someone is searching from a mobile device and giving a higher ranking to sites that are mobile-friendly. Having a mobile-friendly site is increasingly important:

  • 37% of people that search for a product or service from their smartphones will buy online.
  • 32% of people that search for a product or service from their smartphones will buy in store.
  • Either way, the majority of people searching for items on their smartphones are ultimately making a purchase.
  • And these purchases typically happen within two to three hours of the search.

Speak
Never forget that you are delivering information to a phone: include a push-to-call phone number on every page of a mobile site.