7 Tips for a Mobile Friendly Website

Look around on the train, in the coffee shop or in the lunch line at the deli, and you’ll see people on their smartphones checking sports scores, catching up on Facebook—or shopping. Consumers are increasingly shopping via their smartphones; in fact, a recent AT&T survey found that four in 10 small businesses said that customers found their website through a mobile device.*
Your company’s website may work just fine on a computer screen, but chances are it doesn’t perform well on a mobile device. Use these tips to make your site mobile-friendly:
1. Keep navigation simple
Keep your homepage focused on the information that customers are likely to need most while they’re on the go, such as your phone number, address, hours and directions. Also make sure links and buttons are large enough for touchscreen users to click through easily, and place the search box and contact info link high on the page so visitors don’t have to hunt for them.
2. Limit scrolling
Navigating from left to right to find information can be frustrating on a desktop site—never mind on a smaller smartphone screen. Arrange your content in a single, vertical column so viewers only need to scroll down to find what they are looking for. If you have a lot of information to present, consider using a collapsible menu, which allows users to tap open the content they are interested in and hide the rest—Wikipedia does this with its mobile Web pages.
3. Use small images and graphics
Your regular website may be filled with lots of big, pretty pictures, but you may need to rethink that strategy when creating your mobile site. Having too many images can significantly lengthen page load time and increase the odds that visitors will abandon your site. Choose small images or resize existing images from your full website so they load faster on mobile devices. You can always let visitors see larger images by linking to your full site.
4. Minimize keystrokes
Make your mobile-friendly site as simple as you possibly can. Avoid long forms and anything else that requires a lot of typing, and if your site is e-commerce-enabled, ask only for the details necessary to complete the transaction. Consider having users register on your full site first, so their payment details are stored and they only have to enter a username and password to complete a purchase on the mobile site. Whatever you do, make it easy for visitors to find your phone number so they can simply call you to place an order.
5. Highlight a call to action
Make it easy for your visitors to do the things you want them to. Want them to connect with a representative? Offer a click-to-chat feature. Want more newsletter subscribers? Make your sign-up button prominent.
6. Link to your full website
Some of your mobile site visitors may want the option of clicking through to your full site, whether to find a section not included in the mobile version or to see a larger product image. Include a link in the footer, where visitors expect to find it.
7. Get help if you need it
You may be thinking, “This all sounds great, but how do I actually build a mobile site?” Exposure Elements offers businesses a complete mobile platform that can utilize all the latest technologies and adheres to these guidelines to build a mobile site that’s compatible with all major smartphones. We can host the solution and tie it to concurrent text message coupon campaigns.  We can even help you to keep track of your mobile website traffic and visitors.
After we build your mobile website, we will test it on various mobile devices to be sure visitors will have a smooth experience, and even keep it up to date. Visit our website at www.ExposureElements.com to understand more about what we do. 
This blog was originally written for www.openforum.com by AT&T writers.  
*The AT&T SMB eCommerce Survey was conducted online among a representative sample of 310 principals of companies with 1 to 100 employees in the United States by Bredin Business Information Inc. between November 8 and 15, 2010.

SMS Text Messaging - 19 years old

It has been 19 years since the very first text message was sent! The first text message was sent on December 03, 1992 to Richard Jarvis from Neil Papworth, who sent the message using his personal computer. The text message read “Merry Christmas”.

Below is a timeline to sho how text messaging has evolved over the past19 years.

Source: Tatango 

Mobile: CRM’s Next M?

Written by: Eric Harber

The Time Is Right To Integrate Mobile Marketing and CRM. Here’s Why.

“As the world goes social, CRM has to get more personal. We can no longer keep our customers at arm’s length. For years we have focused too much on the management of our customer relationships, and we now need to focus much more on the relationship part, we need to collaborate, we need to inject a sense of mutual benefit into everything we do with our customers.”—Jim Davies, Research Director, Gartner

When you think of customer relationship management, it’s likely you think of large implementations of expensive enterprise software from the world’s largest technology companies. Or perhaps you eschew software and think about some of the cloud-based CRM offerings. But most likely you think about some form of technology for managing various customer touchpoints—process-driven, rules-based technology.

And while this classic definition (rooted in the late 1990s) still has some merit, the “social CRM” movement—moving from transaction to interaction—has pushed it into the 21st century.

While CRM has been about managing cross-channel, online and offline touchpoints, by and large it has excluded mobile marketing from the mix. In its nascence, mobile marketing was siloed, primarily campaign-driven, and loosely integrated within the marketing mix. However, smart companies are recognizing the benefits of using mobile as a foundational element of a multi-channel marketing strategy, and are tightening the connections between CRM systems and mobile-marketing platforms.

Why do mobile and CRM work so well together?

• Value In. Value Out. Mobile can be utilized on both the front-end and back-end of a CRM database. On the front end, it can contribute vital customer information based on mobile interactions; on the back end, the intelligence within a CRM system can be used to generate highly-targeted marketing and advertising communications.
• More Responsiveness=More Data=More Action. With mobile, brands are communicating with their customers on a highly personal medium, their mobile phone. This intimacy builds a direct connection that is more immediate, and thus, more responsive (and the opt-in nature of mobile ensures this responsiveness; if brands are hitting customers with irrelevant content, they will simply opt out). The increased responsiveness allows for rich, deeper interactions and the collection of actionable customer data.
• CRM: Conversations, Relationships, Mobile. More than any other customer communications medium, mobile engenders conversations—and conversations are critical to building customer relationships.

Let’s use a major retailer as an example. The company has a robust CRM infrastructure and already touches its customers and prospects across the usual channels: broadcast; print; online and display advertisements; hardcopy mailings; e-mail and an online store. Bringing mobile into the mix provides a number of valuable features and benefits:

• In-Store “Calls to Action” Create Conversations and Actionable Data: An in-store display invites customers to participate in a giveaway via SMS or QR code. The customer has a chance to win valuable prizes; the retailer gets valuable data by passing the registration information straight into a CRM system. The CRM system generates a PIN for the brand’s Web site, and the customer registers for the site and sweepstakes, providing further valuable information. It’s important that the customer get something of value—in this case, the chance to win a sweepstakes—that is worth in their mind the personal information they must share to enter.
• Mobile Provides Real-Time Data for Multi-channel Data Aggregation, Acquisition and Analysis: The retailer publishes various micro-sites and drives customers to them via SMS campaigns using various calls-to-action in different media. The micro-site usage data is captured and reported to the retailer’s CRM system for cross-channel marketing analytics. The retailer captures SMS campaign user opt-in via Web and email, conducting further campaigns to opted-in users.
• Making Changes in Real Time: Aggregated data can also teach valuable, timely lessons: the retailer can optimize campaign elements based on results and consumer behavior. What content was most compelling? What elements drove the most consumers to opt out? What day and what time of day did they respond?

In the age of Social CRM, smart brands are integrating mobile, the most social of all marketing channels, into their CRM systems. Mobile adds tremendous value on both the front-end and back-end of CRM by quickly creating new conversations that feature critical, actionable customer data that can’t be replicated through other channels.

Customers Embrace Mobile Couponing

Jackie Micucci

Wednesday, Nov 02, 2011 at 3:00 PM

Everybody loves a bargain. Mobile coupons are proving just that. While the coupon format may have morphed from pieces of paper shoppers cut out of the weekly circular to digital scans they store in their trusty smartphones, their popularity continues. Chew on these stats: 20% of smartphone users redeem mobile coupons and that number is expected to increase to 30% in 2013. If you want to know more about how this mobile marketing segment is growing take a close look at our graphic below.

Major Broadcasting Exec at CBS Gets Behind SMS Over QR Codes

More Value in SMS

 

By Stan Davis

At SMS Mobile Marketing Blog we have done several articles on the value of SMS over QR codes and today Mobile Marketer posted an article outlining another major company that has chosen SMS over QR codes. 

Mobile Marketer Article Summary

According to the article, CBS Mobile has chosen to use SMS as its method of engagement in print advertisements for 5 new television series that they will be promoting this fall.  Some of the reasons they stated were as follows

     1) CBS felt that it added a barrier by requiring a download of an app on most smartphones

     2)  An additional barrier is the fact that feature phones aren't supported as completely with the QR Code technology.

     3) SMS is a simple format that can easily create an element of engagement.  Anne O’Grady, executive vice president of marketing at CBS, New York said “Print is wonderful, but to take it to the next level, people actually need to see something additional.”  She went on to say, “We wanted to do something that everyone could interact with,” and “we wanted to use short codes because it’s an easy way to incorporate mobile and give users additional content.”

The Mobile Marketer article said that each ad will have a phone number with a call to action.   When readers respond to that call to action and dial the phone number they will get a text message reply with a link to a video for the TV program being advertised.  

 Why not both?

At the end of the article where comments were posted one of the comments questioned why they don't use both forms of communication.    While the article didn't answer this the longstanding benefits of SMS that weren't mentioned in the article may have some roll in the decision.  Some of these benefits could be the ease to integrate these same SMS call to actions into the television programing where QR codes may present some challenges on screen and the ability to capture mobile phone numbers for future marketing efforts that SMS presents and are not yet commonly available in QR code technology.   

About Author

Stan Davis is the editor of SMS Mobile Marketing Blog and Owner of Northern California Mobile Marketing Service Provider Exposure Elements.  Exposure Elements partners with TxT2Look to deliver Northern California mobile marketing services. 

 

QR codes vs. Text Messaging

A lot has been written about QR codes lately.  They had some serious support from Google for a while as well and deservedly have a place in the big mobile picture.

Less seems to be written and said about using text messaging to access the mobile internet with some attention being paid to text message campaigns. 

Text messaging, though, is still a much more viable medium for connecting with end users.   Today only 35% of mobile phones have the ability to support QR codes and many of those require a conscious effort to download an app that will give your smartphone the ability to support QR codes.  Text messaging is supported on virtually every mobile phone sold in the US today and people are already comfortable with the technology.  Just look around on buses and in shopping malls to see people of every age with their eyes buried into their phone sending or receiving a text message.  Text messaging can do virtually everything that QR codes can but the opposite can't be said.  Text message is a true two-way communication that can engage an interested person and build a dialogue that stimulates a relationship much the same way a conversation with your friend does.  From an advertising and marketing standpoint text messaging can deliver key information back to text message campaign provider that helps them tailor an on going dialogue.  This is something that a QR code can never do on its own.  A text message campaign communication can alert an opt-in user to a specific program or value that can be had within a specific window of time where a QR code is only a passive mechanism for providing information at a point of interest.  But only if the end user's mobile device is equipped for capturing the QR code. 

With that being said there are a few places that QR codes can be effective.  I have found that QR codes are effective on business cards as a way to get contact information in to the contacts registry on a properly equipped smartphone.  As a business there is definitely an advantage to having your contact information on someones mobile smart phone as this gives instant access to your business website, or you directly should the end user feel the need to contact you.  Text messaging could also do this but not as elegantly or efficiently.  Its more likely also that feature phones (mobile phones that don't support internet access) that the integration features for using text messages to and contacts to the mobile phone contact list would not be present so for this group of people text messaging wouldn't be a practical or usable application of the technology.  QR codes can also be more useful in crowded places such as buses or very public places if the messaging would be sent is of a confidential nature. 


In the end, good businesses developing successful marketing campaigns will probably find a place for both.  They can improve their success by evaluating each communication and measuring it against the strengths and weaknesses of each technology to provide the most compelling and engaging experience for their opt-in sms database.


Exposure Elements is a digital marketing service provider in Northern California providing mobile marketing campaigns and services to businesses and the real estate community.  They are backed by the TxT2Look mobile platform and experience to provide comprehensive support throughout the mobile campaign developement process.  Contact them at 408-440-2278 or click here to send them an email. 

The 8 most prevalent trends of mobile marketing

Key Mobile Marketing Trends

Posted by Tyler Orfao

Tue, Jul 19, 2011 @ 08:00 AM

This guest post was written by Christine Herrington, Co-Founder of SEO Skye, a search engine marketing firm based out of Denver, Colorado. Christine recently published a mobile marketing white paper which we asked her to summarize below.
It is a brave new world for mobile marketing, and without a proper guide, you could get lost in all the new developments. To help you better grasp this exciting industry, we have identified the 8 most significant mobile marketing trends of 2011 that are sure to change the mobile marketing world we know now.

Trend 1 - Mobile Advertising Spend is on the Rise.

According to Forrester, mobile advertising in the U.S. will expand to a billion-dollar business in 2011, nearly a third of the predicted global mobile advertising market. By 2014, it has been projected that the U.S. market will more than double in size, reaching $2.5 billion!

Trend 2 - Smartphones are Beginning to Dominate the Mobile World. 

eMarketer calculated that U.S. smartphone users reached 60.2 million by year-end 2010, increasing by nearly 50 percent from 2009. This year is expected to see continued growth, with smart phone users projected to reach 73.3 million by the end of 2011. This projected growth will have smart phone owners accounting for 23%of the mobile user population in 2011; by 2015, they will represent 43%. The rising popularity of smart phones will surely produce an increase of engaged consumers eager to use e-commerce mobile sites for their purchasing.

Trend 3 – Demand for Tablets is Significantly Increasing.

In hopes of tapping into the tablet gold rush, Phone manufacturers like Samsung, Blackberry, and HTC have all begun launching their own tablets to compete with the iPad. eMarketer projects that 24 million tablets will sell in 2011, with the iPad's overall share of the market dropping to 80%. This trend creates a new and important mobile marketing frontier for businesses to capitalize on.

Trend 4 - Mobile Optimization Becomes a Reality.

Constant innovations and improvements are being made in mobile website and application design, making the user experience more engaging and simple. It will be pivotal to optimize your URL for mobile access, and to continually optimize your mobile site for speed, image rendering, and accessibility.  In other words, all of the traditional search engine optimization rules apply and become vitally important to follow.

Trend 5 - Mobile Goes Social.

According to Nielsen, social networking was the fastest-growing category among users of both apps and mobile browsers, growing 240 percent and 90 percent respectively. eMarketer estimates that by 2015, the population of mobile social network users will reach 79 million. Blue Fountain Media found that Americans spend one of every six minutes online using a social network, offering marketers a tremendous opportunity to increase their exposure time through mobile social networking.

Trend 6 – Location-Based Mobile Marketing Will Become A Necessity.

Users no longer want to just update their status; they want to be able to adjust their social networking experience around their geographic location. SNL Kagan reported that location-centric social networks such as Foursquare and Gowalla experienced explosive growth in 2010, with the total user base nearly tripling over the year.With Facebook now offering their Places Application, consumers will begin to expect and rely on mobile sites and apps to respond according to their geographic location.

Trend 7 – The Debate Between Mobile Applications Versus Mobile Website Continues.

It is still unclear as to which mobile format is more effective: mobile application or mobile website. Experts say it really depends on what you are trying to accomplish with your mobile campaign. According to Geekwire, mobile websites are more effective at reaching larger audiences and providing instant updates, while native apps promote better connectivity, engagement, and performance.Our philosophy - why skip out, in either case, on such an affordable user-friendly medium?

Trend 8 – Consumers want Accessibility.

Consumers no longer only rely on computers to access the Internet. Mobile Groove found that the average session time for a mobile browser user is 6 minutes, which they will perform continuously throughout the day. This research suggests that consumers want mobile pages to work as quickly as possible. If the mobile page does not perform promptly, consumers will quit their sessions in a fit of frustration. Now used to mobile browsers, Consumers now concern themselves with the information businesses provide on their mobile site, and the ease and speed in which they can access it. The easy answer for curbing mobile user's appetites is “there’s an app for that.”

Marketing Takeaway

The mobile marketing world is expanding and transforming rapidly before our eyes. Users are becoming increasingly dependent on mobile sites and applications for instant access to information, tools, deals, and product research. It will be integral for businesses to adjust their marketing strategy to accommodate for these changes in consumer behavior.

Read more: http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/20034/8-Key-Mobile-Marketing-Trends.aspx#ixzz1TBPjE7yG