A recent study put on by the MMA in conjunction with research partner Synovate has unveiled some new mobile usage and mobile marketing data that for the most part is nothing new, but does include some interesting findings.
Not surprising at all: the study revealed greater use of mobile data services in the last year, with four in five subscribers text messaging, and two in five texting daily. Picture and video messaging, along with mobile camera use, are also among the fastest-growing non-voice activities gaining momentum. This higher data-usage will inevitably boost mobile marketing effectiveness over time.
Still, the study showed only 1 in 5 US subscribers browse the mobile web, and many of which don’t even know what browser they’re using let alone the mobile marketing efforts being displayed to them. Now that the iPhone is the top selling mobile device in the US, its surprising that mobile web browsing hasn’t gone up more sharply.
Overall, 1 in 4 U.S. mobile consumers say they are either moderately or strongly interested in mobile marketing, unchanged from last year. That compares to one-half and two-thirds of mobile users in Asia-Pacific and Latin American markets, respectively, expressing interest.
While many believed mobile marketing would grow by leaps and bounds over the last year, this study and several others have proved that while it’s definitely growing, it’s not quite as much as industry experts had hoped. Still, the best demographic to market to from a mobile perspective is the 18-24 year olds. The best ways to reach this group remain promotional tools such as downloadable ringtones, mobile coupons, location-based information, status alerts and text-to-win sweepstakes.
