Mobile marketing is very different from email and it has to be done right. If your existing email strategy is to build the largest email database possible, then mobile needs to be about building a database of your best and most loyal customers. Mobile is about LOYALTY – period.

Those who are willing to have their day interrupted as their pockets buzz with your offers are going to be your best customers. If you have the typical ad agency or email marketer mentality of “batch and blast,” mobile is going to be a disaster for you. It’s called SPAM. Customers will revolt and you’ll get bad press, possibly legal action.

However, if you learn to treat mobile as a totally different type of channel, it can and will be incredibly successful. Text messaging open and response rates are record-breaking and unlike email, most customers love it. Done well, it’s seen as a customer service, not spam or a sales pitch. With success in mobile, there is a new set of best practices, which I’ve outlined below:

Mobile – For VIPs only?

Your first approach to a mobile strategy should be to offer something only available via the mobile phone. The incentive should be good and be the only place your customer can take you up on your offer.

I am sure most of you have been to an exclusive bar or nightclub before. Ever been in line when someone walks right past you up to the front of the velvet ropes and right into the club? He or she is what is known as a VIP. This is how you should treat your mobile club. They are VIPs that can get exclusive updates, offers, and content only available in the mobile channel. Make it exclusive and make it appealing.

Free or Charge?

Should it be free to signup to mobile offers? I don’t believe so. It’s shouldn’t be prohibitive either. Vodafone/Telecom ‘kindly’ get the major share anyway, charging 20c when customers text in using a signup keyword. It’s optional for the business to put a premium on this, but in my book, 20c is about right. Charging 50 or 99c (as seen on some TV mobile/SMS promotions) is a ripoff.

Building your list

There’s lots of traditional ways to gather mobile phone numbers. Have customers fill out paper forms, online etc. However the best is to use a keyword, being a permission-based tool to automatically build the list. The nominal 20c cost involved for the customer also provides the disincentive to minimise abuse of the offer and system.  There seems to be an entire industry and sub-culture out there of people (i.e. low value, disloyal customers), that do nothing but sign up to any offer or competition that’s going.

In fact for this and other reasons, I personally believe the ONLY way to gather customers mobile phone numbers is via a mobile keyword facility, and not a form on a website or even a paper form they fill out in-store, which then requires someone to manually enter things into the system. Sure, you can promote the mobile keyword and offer on your website, in emails and with printed brochures, signs, magazine ads, even on radio/TV, but the opt-in process should use a mobile SMS message facility with keyword. It’s simple and most people are happy to do it if there’s a chance of getting a discount or special offer.

Make sure when you are opting people into your database, you not only get them to join, but you could also manage their expectations with the types of messages they will get, how often they will get them, and how they can opt out. The careful use of different SMS/TXT keywords and opt-in processes as well as various web/online mobile list building tools make this bit easy.

If I was to tell you that by sticking to this very basic strategy you could build a solid database of loyal, high value customers, who will look forward to your messages and offers on a regular basis. Done well, the opt-out or unsubscribe rate is typically under 1% per campaign.

Show me the money!

Let’s look at the numbers. Initially at least, your mobile database is probably not going to be as big as your email database, but is that important? Answer this:  which is a bigger return –a call-to-action that sees an average 20% take (redemption rate) on a mobile database of 3,000, or a 2% redemption rate on an email database of 10,000 people?  If you guessed the mobile database made you more money, you guessed correctly. (Example calculations see note 1).

Time and time again mobile has a higher response rate.  Let’s take a look at the reasons why:

• 95% of cell phones have SMS capabilities and 87% of the population has a cell phone.
• You can reach someone no matter where they are.
• Over 95% of text messages are read within 15 minutes.
• Unlike email, there are virtually no delivery issues with SMS. If you send it, they will get it, and right into their inbox.
• All mobile clubs should have a keyword opt in so you cannot sign up anyone but yourself.
• 33% of email addresses change on a yearly basis, but with number portability (the ability to take a number from carrier to carrier), people are ditching their home phones and keeping their cell phone number for life.

Enough said…

Note 1. Typical costs: 10,000 html emails @ 3c per recipient, plus typical $1,000 copywriting, design and setup fee = $1,300. Typical 20% open rate and a 2% (max, often much less) redemption rate = 200 sales.

Mobile costs 3,000 list @ say 18c ea = $640 incl average $100 setup.  98% open rate and a 20% redemption rate = 600 sales.

Above inspired (and elements extracted) from an article on mobilestorm.com

Related posts:

1. Mobile Marketing – Some Real-world Stats
2. Restaurants – Natural Affinity with Mobile
3. Your Customers have gone Mobile – Have YOU?
4. Adding Mobile to your Next Mailer