Mobile Phone Ad Trends

Mobile Advertising is catching on in different markets. Some of the larger companies that have been using mobile advertising have been primarily using banner ads and mobile display ads, according to the Wall Street Journal. Now, they report there appears to be a shift by some of the those companies to using search advertising, due in part, to the limitations of mobile devices and the apparent intrusiveness of the banner and mobile display ads.

Whether or not the pattern becomes a trend or not, I think there is a strong impetus to see this shift unfold in the upcoming months. For one, mobile advertising targets a subsection of the online market. People on the go, in a hurry, who are socially active and social media receptive, are a demographic that substantially represents this market. I recently read in Paul Gillin’s ‘Secrets of Social Media Marketing’ where he quoted Giovanni Gallucci, cofounder of Dexterity Media, stating “People on MySpace aren’t running away from pedophiles and stalkers. They’re running away from marketers and advertisers.”

I think most of us can relate to that. New social media marketing is about relationships and the perception of the relationship. A good example is visible on Twitter. People are on Twitter for different reasons. It is a popular and growing social media network. Some people are trying to figure out how to cash in on it. They are trying to use it as a conduit to fill the funnel. With Twitter, if you want to monetize the experience then bring value to those who follow you, be a real person and pitch yourself in a non-intrusive way. If every time you tweet, it’s an ad, people won’t bother to even look at it. In fact, they may put you on block. It’s no different than your cousin or neighbor who only calls you or drops by when they want to try selling you something. You probably will avoid them as much as possible. The same principle can be applied to mobile marketing.

From the standpoint of mobile device limitations, not everyone has a mobile device that is capable of displaying the banners and display ads. So, advertisers are missing that mix of the target audience if they are not using search advertising. For these reasons it would make sense that the pattern could become a trend.