It’s the time of the year when every research company and industry organization puts out a prediction for what’s to come in 2010. The Mobile Marketing Association this month put out a list of 10 industry predictions for mobile marketing in North America for the coming year.
What do you think about these predictions from MMA for 2010?
10. Mobile Healthcare
Look out for apps that diagnose, doctors that text, and medical reminders. One recent successful mobile campaign run by mobileStorm for Kaiser Permanente sent SMS reminders to patients and saw a 30% cost savings. Expect more of these and related campaigns in teh coming year.
9. Real Time Mobile Coupons
The rise of localization apps for mobile means that marketers can, and will target customers nearby with specialized promotions. MMA says to look for augmented reality to play a larger role in location-based advertising.
8. Mobile TV
Major sporting events in 2010, including the Winter Olympics and the 2010 World Cup will raise awareness and usage of mobile video. New ad units will help subsidize free content.
7. Texting Limitations
MMA thinks handsets will be built to automatically power off texting functionality when you’re doing things like driving, where being distracted by a text could be deadly.
6. Mobile Barcodes
As technology for mobile barcodes becomes more standardized and phones come with higher quality cameras, mobile barcodes will offer new ways for mobile marketers to promote products and discounts.
5. Aggregators Will Be Key
Aggregators will expand their business beyond shortcodes, aggregating things like location, customer service, and mobile commerce.
4. Free GPS
Sorry Magellan and Tom Tom, but with Google offering free turn-by-turn GPS in its Android 2.0 OS, and Apple surely trying to follow suit to compete, the end of the stand alone GPS device is coming. With free GPS, advertisers and marketers can use the tool to promote local offers.
3. Mobile Skype
Video conferencing services will be big business in 2010, says MMA. More people will use WiFi to video conference, disrupting the non-wireless video conferencing industry.
2. New Ways to Measure Mobile Marketing Success
Campaign effectiveness will need to be measured in new and innovative ways. No longer is a simple ROI equation enough to prove success of a campaign.
1. Mobile’s Eyes and Ears
The mobile phone is moving well beyond being just a device to make calls on. “Photographing, recording, touching, locating, shaking, accelerating and blowing” are all possible on the modern mobile phone. As mobile technology moves forward, it will continue to disrupt markets that were seemingly unrelated when cell phone technology got its start.
See the full list of 2010 predictions from the MMA here.
