A couple of recent articles related to mobile advertising have recently appeared on Tech Crunch. These articles combined with another study that I covered in an earlier blog post clearly show that mobile advertising is not a wise use of marketing resources for Denver small business owners.
The Rise of (the) Android
We'll start off with the good news
TechCrunch - citing an AdMob study - has shown that mobile ads shown on Android have doubled since October. Clearly, the introduction of Motorola's Droid is largely responsible for the increase in ad impressions.
Now the not so good news
TechCrunch also recently ran a post discussing which mobile operating system users were likely to click on ads. Here are the highlights from the post:
- Despite all the new Android Users, they were one of the least likely groups to click on ads
- Palm and Blackberry users were least likely to click on ads
- Iphone/Ipod users were well above the average for mobile users when it comes to clicking on ads
Mobile Users Don't Click on Ads Much
The fact that IPhone users were more inclined to click on ads than most other mobile users is not good news. I recently wrote a blog post which covered a Chitika study which showed that IPhone users clicked on ads just .30% of the time - less than half the clickthrough rate of desktop/laptop computer users. The Chitika study mentioned that mobile users in general had a clickthrough rate of a little more than half of non-mobile (desktop/laptop) users.
How Does this Help Me Market My Denver Small Business?
If you own a Denver small business, you probably should not be participating in mobile marketing right now. For most websites, the percentage of mobile visits is around 1-2%. Some websites may see as much as 5 or 6%. In any case, the penetration of mobile phones with respect to browsing is still very low. Combine the relatively low penetration of mobile with a clickthrough rate that is just half of non-mobile, and mobile still represents a very tiny piece of the pie.
I frequently post about mobile advertising, because I do believe that it will emerge as a viable advertising opportunity in the future. Most Denver small businesses have extremely limited resources and should not spend a lot of time or effort focusing on a mere 1 or 2 percent of their Internet visits.
Restaurants are a major exception
If you're a Denver restaurant owner, you need to be exploring mobile right now. Mobile offers unique opportunities for restaurant owners to market their business - especially to existing customers. In a previous blog post, I discuss mobile marketing for restaurant owners in the Denver metro area. A well constructed mobile marketing campaign can keep Denver diners coming back to your restaurant.