Mobile devices continue to be a significant advertising channel according to recent research GfK Technology recently undertook in the UK.  The proportion of consumers who had received some form of mobile advertising stood at 47%, fairly consistent with the findings from Q2 ’09.  The big shift is perhaps the growth of iPhone as a staggering 84% of iPhone users say they have seen mobile advertising in the last 3 months vs. 45% of all other mobile phone users.

SMS continues to be the dominant form of mobile advertising with 38% of UK consumers receiving at least one in the last quarter.  It’s therefore not surprising that network operators are putting significant investment into this area with O2 launching their SMS marketing service, More, in December and Orange partnering a trial with Blyk mid ’09.

Work that GfK has undertaken in this area identifies a number of criteria that brands need to consider in order for this form of marketing to be most effective.  GfK recruited a number of consumers to an opt-in ‘panel’ to trial mobile advertising.  Although this took place some time ago, the findings are just as relevant today.  The key findings included:

• Positive consumer response:  The trial prompted a favourable reaction from participants with a staggering 84% saying they were likely to recommend the service; explicit permission to receive text messages was considered to be critical
• Relevance:  Appropriate targeting of offers to participants was important and was felt to have driven the positive response
• Creative execution:  Triallists looked for snappy, entertaining or informative text adverts with a strong emphasis on humour

The trail was able to show a positive impact of advertising on raising awareness and on building brand perceptions but there was a striking 63% of people claiming to have replied or taken action as a result of receiving a text advert.  In fact a significant number of responses were generated to text adverts that had not specifically requested a response.  For example, Carlsberg lager ran a campaign involving humour and timely use of the medium, such as ‘PINT! It’s your round.  Probably…Carlsberg.’  This went out at 10.30pm on a Friday and a range of responses came back including ‘It was and I got 6 in’!

In this context, the fact that SMS advertising has held up so well is no surprise and bodes well for other forms of mobile advertising, and in principle, the mobile device is the ultimate medium for one-to-one interactive marketing.  However, it is our view that brands must not ignore the need for the advertising to be opt-in, relevant and for the copy to be creatively executed, otherwise we will see the promise of this medium quickly evaporate.

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Tags: Advertising, Carlsberg, Creative Copy, iPhone, Mobile Advertising, Mobile Marketing, Network Operators, O2, Orange, SMS, Texting