Mobile engagement is relevant again

Mobile engagement has always been present in the collective digital marketing consciousness. Every marketer knows that almost the entire population of consumers are on mobile. As smartphone technologies continue to improve and audiences become more dependent on gadgets, consumer engagement has gone through a lot of changes. The unfortunate thing is that many brands have become so overly complacent, thinking that old ways work just fine.

That’s until ad-blockers came and changed everything. Open Market’s senior market development manager Oisin Lunny said that the unprecedented emergence of ad-blockers has restarted not only the mobile engagement conversation but also the method itself. Advertisers, app developers, and brands had to look at their existing engagement models to find solutions. These ad-blockers, after all, could become the new norm.

“That’s not to say that all mobile advertising takes an ‘interruption approach’ but greater focus on the user experience should be placed on any mobile engagement strategy. With ad blocking technology, once it’s turned on, consumers may never know if a brand got it right after the debate,” Lunny noted to Fourth Source.

That means that popular re-targeting tactics that offer adverts based on the pretext may no longer be possible. This recent “holy grail” for marketers is no longer a scalable option.”

Back to the drawing board

Even Google’s Larry Page admitted that among the best counterpunches against ad-blockers is going back to creativity.

“Yeah, we’ve been dealing with ad blocking for a long time. There’s been a number of different products to do that. Part of it is the industry needs to do better at producing ads that are less annoying and that are quicker to load, and all those things. I think we need to do a better job of that as an industry,” he said at last November’s shareholders’ meeting.

What does it take to engage “mobile-dependent” consumers? According to American mobile engagement provider Urban Airship, mobile engagement is a ticket to keeping consumers glued and loyal to a brand. Consumers, according to its own market study, still love to be notified, to be served, and to feel that they are an invaluable part of a community spearheaded and built by the brands they like.  

“Quality mobile engagement should empower a customer to engage with a brand at their exact moment of inspiration. This can mean informing a user’s future purchase, or simply delivering customer service right when they need it,” Urban Airship said in its latest mobile market study.

It also revealed that 70 percent of app users will defect after 30 days of brand inactivity, or inefficiency. It also suggested that, since they know that brands are upping their game, mobile users have become more demanding. This, in turn, poses a challenge to the brands.

Re-inspiring mobile engagement

One prime model of a brand that has taken the challenge seriously is business and finance news app Born2Invest. Before its launch last year, the curation market was deficient on human-curated multilingual and multimarket apps.

“We are not the first one to have writers and translators. But we are the first to curate beyond major languages such as English and Spanish. We have also pioneered the ‘real global approach,’ as we aim to be available in over 150 markets soon. And yes, in their respective local languages,” Born2Invest chief executive Dom Einhorn said.

This is mobile engagement at its finest: reaching audiences through their own languages. The app endeavors to make the locals be acquainted with business news from their regions.

Even LinkedIn wants to revamp its brand. The company revealed at the Talent Connect conference in Anaheim that it will divide its content into new sections. It sees this as a way to improve job searching and networking.

Thanks to ad-blockers, everyone has realized that things need some urgent facelifts here and there. Hopefully, it’s not just a phase.