Mobile Advertising will expand into a billion dollar a year industry in 2011. eMarketer calculated that U.S. smartphone users reached 60.2 million at the end of 2010, nearly doubling user rates from 2009. With smartphones projected to grow to 73 million users by year’s end, this market should not be ignored. There is a fundamental shift in the way consumers are finding, shopping and interacting with your business and your focus should be on how to maximize the effectiveness of your efforts in this new landscape. Look at every mobile customer’s contact with you as a potential sale, since they have the convenience of making a purchase in the palm of their hand.

The increasing use of mobile devices for web browsing has resulted in an explosion of websites optimized to display on their web browsers. The “Click to Call” feature allows mobile device users to click on your website’s phone number and call you directly. This Feature is a must in this new mobile market and tracking results is just as important as the feature itself. By having a mobile website, and allowing customers to “Click to Call” you have substantially increased your chances of customer interaction. Remember that mobile users are out and about and often times looking for reviews, product information and they are often looking to purchase.

Customer Relations Management (CRM)

Integrating mobile into your CRM program will add value to your loyal customers and improve your customer service. Along with sending out information to customers via email or by traditional phone, you can relay that same information through mobile devices and deliver it to users anytime, anywhere.

Short Message Service (SMS)

The text message market has seen huge jumps in popularity over the last year. Statistics are showing that 97% of SMS marketing messages are opened, and are usually opened within a few hours. SMS is a great way to communicate with returning customers or people who sign up to receive deals or offers from you. Being able to create a conversation with customers is priceless and the SMS marketing is a great tool to stay in touch with your mobile clients.

Mobile Coupons

Now that we have explored CRM and SMS strategies, you may be asking “what will I send to my customers?” Mobile coupons are a great way to offer discounts to both new customers and returning customers. Many mobile coupons highlight loyalty programs or are used to up sell extra services or products to your customers. Offering a static coupon on your mobile site that customers can mention after they “click to call” you is a great way to drive business. Online coupons have been hot for a while now and I believe that this trend isn’t going to go away anytime soon.

Location Based Marketing (LBM)

This type of marketing delivers content to mobile customers if they are near your business. This is going to become a growing part of effective marketing programs in the years to come.  There are many sites that are involved with LBM marketing (Gowalla, foursquare, yelp and brightkite to name a few). Google also launched a GPS based search feature for mobile a few months back. Location Based Marketing is something to keep your eyes on and make sure to stay up to date on the progression.

Insideout Solutions can help if you need a mobile site or need any information on mobile marketing. With these new marketing strategies poised to grow aggressively, the time is now to get your mobile site active and learn how to tap into that billion dollar a year market.