Tips and How-to’s

It’s all too clear these days that a mobile optimized website is no longer a “want”, but a “need” for companies big and small. Last week, we introduced you to a set of statistics that outlined the top 5 objectives companies have while investing in mobile. Over half of the surveyed respondents included increasing customer engagement in their answers, making it the most common objective…not entirely surprising.

A marketer’s job is to increase, and maximize, their brands’ relationship with the customer — that’s Marketing 101. Mobile devices provide an always-on, always-connected channel to foster this relationship. Those that aren’t utilizing this powerful device are missing out on engaging with their customers in today’s hyper-connected consumer landscape.

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StatCounter recently revealed that mobile internet usage has doubled year over year since 2009—accounting for 8.5% of global access in January 2012. And that’s not including tablets! Following this Moore’s law-esque trajectory, we could be looking at more than a quarter of global internet usage coming from mobile devices by 2014.

Add this to the IDC’s prediction that, by 2015, there will be more mobile internet users than desktop users in the US and it’s quite obvious why today’s companies thinking “mobile first” are set to be future leaders.

With statistical backing like this, there is no doubt that all signs point to mobile marketing spend increasing this year.  And it’s not just for the big guys either—small and mid-size businesses are finally beginning to understand that they too can realize a return on the mobile consumer revolution.

But what, specifically, are companies looking to accomplish with an increase in their mobile marketing dollars?

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CES has come and gone, Mobile World Congress is less than a month away, and following both we are primed for a new wave of next-gen smartphones and tablets to drool over. But with the onslaught of saliva-inducing nerd treats ahead comes an age old discussion and issue within the mobile industry… FRAGMENTATION.

(take a second for the mobile developers to shudder)

Fragmentation has been around forever–differentiating a product is a basic concept in any business strategy. Different manufacturers make things with different parts, and different products are going to work differently in hopes of creating one-of-a-kind value. In mobile, the issue is the same. You’ve got a multitude of manufacturers creating devices with different hardware for multiple OS’s that each support their own browsers (some supporting multiple browsers) and applications. Developing a consistently exceptional user experience, while taking each flavor into account sounds rough, doesn’t it? Well it is.

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If you’re thinking about launching your first mobile marketing campaign or building your mobile website this year – you’re not being innovative. In fact, you are seriously lagging behind. Mobile use reached unseen levels over the last two months, with over 10% of all sales coming from mobile devices.

And if the 2011 holiday shopping season is any indication, we’ve reached a turning point:

Welcome to the fourth installment of our 2011: A Mobile Year in Review Q&A style blog series that features the thoughts and insights of mobile industry luminaries, media executives and brand marketers.

In this post, we interview Ethan Alexander, VP of Mobile for LivePerson, Inc (@LivePerson) and leading industry figure for over 15 years. Ethan shares why it’s difficult to choose only one great mobile innovation this year, why LivePerson’s clients are so interested in advancing their mobile initiatives and why mobile chat is essential to the customer experience. Lastly, Ethan compares mobile growth to the early days of the internet and decides what he thinks 2012 will bring.

Ethan Alexander is the VP of Mobile for LivePerson, Inc., which provides online engagement solutions that facilitate real-time assistance and advice. The company’s hosted platform supports and manages real-time online interactions for businesses and independent experts. With its B2B services, chat, voice/click-to-call, email, self-service/knowledgebase and now mobile interactions are managed from a single agent desktop. Ethan spearheads the company’s efforts to extend real-time, intelligent interactions beyond the browser to anywhere with mobile service. Previous to LivePerson, Ethan was a part of the mobile leadership team at Salesforce.com where he helped develop their mobile platform and business strategy from the ground up after the 2006 purchase of Sendia, where he ran business development and partner efforts. Through the years, Ethan has worked closely with leading device manufacturers, various network operators and mobile integration and app development partners.

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Who doesn’t like a little recognition for a job well done? We sure do! Especially when it comes in the form of an award from an esteemed industry organization like DIGIDAY, Mobile Village or International Academy of the Visual Arts.

We are pleased to announce that last week, our Citysearch mobile site took home the 2011 Mobile Superstar Award from Mobile Village — our 5th award this year! To honor the fantastic work everyone on our team has done, from design and product management to QA, operations and engineering, let’s take a quick rundown. Drum roll please!

1. Mobile Star Awards – Superstar Award for Best Mobile Marketing Success Story – Citysearch
2. DIGIDAY Mobi Awards – Best Mobile Site of 2011 – Fandango
3. Silver Davey Award – Entertainment – Fandango (Mobile Web)
4. Silver Davey Award – Guides/Ratings/Reviews – Fandango (Mobile Web)
5. Silver Davey Award – Guides/Ratings/Reviews – Citysearch (Mobile Web)

We’d like to give a huge thanks to everyone involved, especially our partners and clients that helped make this year so successful. Here’s to an even better 2012!

Its undeniable that mobile devices have taken unprecedented root in the lives of millions of Americans and billions across the globe in the past 12 months. We are connected 24/7. We simply can not sleep, work, eat, vacation, shop or even go to the loo without our mobile devices. For the first time in history, the number of smartphones in circulation is close to eclipsing the number of feature phones. Tablets, grew to become so dominant, they are infringing on PC market share.

To recap all that happened in the world of mobile in 2011, we are kicking off a short series “2011: A Mobile Year in Review” featuring mobile industry luminaries, media executives and brand marketers. They will guide us through this year’s key innovations, noteworthy campaigns, effective mobile techniques, smartphone and tablet trends, HTML5 adoption and other hot mobile topics.

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The day has finally come. The relationship between the two of you has seen its up and downs, but you both are ready for the next step. The pit in your stomach is only outweighed by your intense need for one another. You toss all doubts and the butterflies aside, slowly bend down and rest your knee to the floor and fumble around in your pocket for that expensive little detail. There’s nothing more left than to pull out your mobile phone, take a breath and lay it all on the line—“will you buy my product?”

Granted this may be just a slight stretch from reality, but mobile user engagement should be treated with just as much due diligence as popping The Question. Whether you’re a first timer or a seasoned mobile pro, these 5 questions should guide you through the many pitfalls of the constantly evolving mobile landscape and help you design the user experience that delivers pure bliss. (more…)

Last month we discussed our Top 5 Indicators for Mobile Analytics and gave you a general overview of the types of metrics you should be looking at when judging the performance of your mobile website. Today, we’d like to take things just a step further and dive into a key method of analytics reporting. This method, outlined last week in a highly recommended webinar by Google exec, Avinash Kaushik, will allow your analytics team to get a better understanding of your overall mobile success and how to optimize your site in certain areas to increase this success.

An Acquisition-Behavior-Outcome (A-B-O) report can be created in any of the top analytics providers and will deliver the full story of your website’s performance utilizing any number of different metrics. It takes into account the end to end journey of your visitors, from the time they land on your site to the time they leave or complete a specific task or goal. These three segments should be integral pieces in each and every single analytics report you create.

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