Posted on April 16th, 2023.

According to statista.com, the number of ‘smartphone’ users, worldwide, went from1.06 billion to 3.8 billion between the beginning of the year 2012 and the end of 2021. Yes, within the past ten years, smartphone use, worldwide, has more than tripled! And, though the trend is for smartphone sales to level off, we are still talking, easily, hundreds of millions of new users every year for the next few years. Estimates on the number of current worldwide ‘mobile phone users vary up to 5 billion and more. Every user is a customer, not for just the phone technology, but for the products and services now conveniently made available through it. In case your business involves marketing, and you were unaware of this historic trend, or just how significant it has become.

            The term mobile commerce was originally coined in 1997 by Kevin Duffey at the launch of the Global Mobile Commerce Forum, to mean the delivery of electronic commerce capabilities directly into the consumer’s hand, anywhere, via wireless technology. Most every significant development involving this opportunity has been developed this century, i.e., within the past twenty years.

            Mobile marketing is a multi-channel online marketing technique focused on reaching a specific audience on their smartphones, feature phones, tablets, or any other related devices through websites, E-mail, SMS and MMS, social media, or mobile applications. It is the art of marketing your business to appeal to mobile device users. Skillfully done, mobile marketing provides customers and potential customers using smartphones with personalized, time- and location-sensitive information so that they can get what they need when and where they need it, even if they are on the go.

            As the number of mobile device users has increased, so have the quantity and the quality of the hardware and software tools available to facilitate it. Currently, these would include 5G, EDGE, GPRS, Wi-Fi, SMS, GPS, and USSD. Ways of doing business and marketing have tremendously evolved as rapidly as advancements in hardware.

            In-app mobile marketing sometimes referred to as app-based marketing refers to the deployment of advertisements directly within an app itself. Since over 90% of time spent on smartphones is used to view apps, this is perhaps the most effective and cost-efficient marketing technique available to advertisers today. Jan 29, 2019. Likewise, marketing within games where the player level of engagement is already high can return great results.

            Every established company doing business online has already incorporated mobile marketing in its marketing mix. Content is now also driven partially by technologies such as QR codes and augmented reality. Mobile device users have simply found it more convenient to shop online. Location-based services using GPS or Google Maps have aided businesses in creating consumers’ awareness, interest, desire, and action. Mobile marketing still has plenty of growth potential as technological development never stops.