We have entered a new age of mobility. According to trends forecasters The Future Foundation, the amount of time we spend outside the home will increase by 31% by 2020. They justified this bold claim by showing how the trends for eating out, visiting attractions and travelling are all on the increase. Consequently, products that make mobility easier or enhance the mobile experience are becoming ever more important. How did people kill time in a supermarket queue before the invention of the mobile phone? When did someone decide that drinking coffee while walking down the street was a cool thing to do?
The mobile phone has become the ultimate connection device for the increasingly mobile consumer, whether they want to take photos, listen to music, check their current account balances, enter a competition using the text function; access the net or even make a phone call. Advertisers are already presented with a wide range of options when it comes to using mobile phones as an advertising or promotional channel, although there are strict guidelines governing mobile campaigns: users must have specifically opted in to receive advertising messages. While this does restrict the reach of campaigns, it also opens up interesting targeting opportunities: for example, advertisers can target specific age groups, genders and areas of the country.
Mobile can also be used as an extension to campaigns in other media. For example, posters and TV ads for films now frequently include a call-to-action that invites the public to 'text 'Film Title' to a specific number to see exclusive clips'. Respondents will then be given access to a WAP site where they can access video and audio content. Another way that mobile can be used is for the distribution and redemption of special offers and coupons. This is particularly effective for FMCG advertisers who can send offers directly to their customers.
Mobile marketing is also being used to deepen relationships with existing customers. For example, travel company Expedia offers a service where they will remind customers of their holiday details just prior to a trip and Camelot offers a play-by-text service, where users are reminded of the jackpot for that night's draw and offered the chance to buy lottery tickets via text. As handsets become more sophisticated the possibilities for advertisers will increase dramatically, especially once mobile video technology becomes more widely available.
The ubiquitous mobile phone has been the major winner in this new age of mobility, but it has been closely followed by the city free newspapers; the publishing phenomenon of the year. They have bucked the trend of declining newspaper sales; you cannot hope to reach young urbanites in most of the cities around the world without using them.
The poster industry has been an obvious beneficiary of the increased time we all spend outside the home. Marketing itself as "the last mass media", thereby exploiting the fragmentation of the television market, expenditure on outdoor media grew by 6% in 2005, the largest growth rate of any channel apart from the spectacularly booming internet. The outdoor industry's share of advertising revenue is set to increase still further with the rapid roll-out of digital poster technology. Viacom Outdoor was recently awarded the London Underground contract on the back of a commitment to invest £50m on the digitisation of the underground poster network. In addition to opening up new creative possibilities, especially the use of moving imagery and sound, the digitization of the poster will, for the first time, allow advertisers to buy different day-parts.
The implications for advertisers of this new age of mobility are clear. With their audiences spending more of their lives outside the home, they cannot continue rely almost entirely on in-home media, especially television. Engaging consumers on the move will become a major priority. Fortunately, technological innovations in mobile phones and outdoor, combined with the continued survival of key print brands. that can adapt themselves to the requirements of a mobile consumer, mean that there is no shortage of opportunities to reach and engage people outside the home.
