Tips from the FTC for Mobile Marketing

Mobile applications are critical to today’s marketing environment.  The number of Smartphone users is skyrocketing.   The Pew Research Center indicates that 45% of adults and 66% of Americans aged 18-29 have a Smartphone and 25% of adults own a tablet.   According to a survey by ReturnPath quoted in Joel Book’s Exact Target blog, nearly half of all emails are read on mobile devices.  What this trend means is that marketers need to get savvy about all aspects of mobile marketing, including best practices in privacy and security.  Mobile marketing has expanded to include SMS/text messages, in-app advertising, mobile action codes like QR codes, mobile coupons, check-in promotions, mobile payments or other aspects of digital wallets, emails, telemarketing calls to a mobile devices, RFID tags and much more.

Mobile Marketing has its challenges because fewer ads display on mobile devices and users are still somewhat reluctant to purchase on them (although they seem to be more likely to purchase on tablets rather than Smartphones).  All this will certainly change as users become more familiar with these devices.

I recently attended the Promotion Marketing Association Marketing (PMA, recently rechristened BAA, Brand Activation Association) Promotion Law conference in Chicago which covered some practical tips for launching mobile applications.  The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is only one agency involved in the oversight and regulation of mobile marketing is charged with protecting consumers and suggests these tips for implementing mobile marketing applications.

      1.  Tell the Truth.  Tell the truth about what your app can do.  False or misleading claims anger users and can land you in legal hot water.  If you have health safely or performance claims (i.e., our pedometer will help you lose weight), you need to back these up with solid scientific evidence.  Disclosure must be ‘clear and conspicuous,’ which is not always easy on small screens.

      2.   Respect Privacy.  The mobile application, unlike the company’s legacy applications, may offer the chance to incorporate privacy concerns from the beginning, which the FTC calls ‘privacy by design’  The FTC suggests only collecting the information you need, storing it securely and disposing of it when no longer needed.  Some other privacy tips include:

a.       Being transparent about data practices

b.      Honoring published privacy practices

c.       Protecting Children’s privacy by adhering to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) and getting parental consent before collecting information from children under 13 years of age.

      3. Offer choices that are easy to find. Tools that allow for choices in how to use the app and have privacy settings, opt-outs and other ways to control their information is good business practice.  The standard should be ‘clear and conspicuous;’ make privacy choices easy to use and then follow through on your promises.

You can get more information from the “Marketing Your Mobile App Get it Right from the Start” and other documents available at business.ftc.gov.  How hard do you think it is it to follow these guidelines and implement a successful mobile app?

By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on Google+ and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.

Integrating Digital Marketing Thought into Digital Strategy

Hello everyone and Happy 2013!  After a brief break from blogging and a two week respite from social media over the holidays, I have lots of new ideas to share and welcome your comments.  Today I want to talk about how Interactive technology has changed the basic way we look at the marketing strategy framework. Instead of just thinking about digital strategy at the end of the process, or as another chapter, as many marketing texts do now, should we not be thinking about completely revamping the process of marketing strategy formation?

For example, we know that B2C consumers and B2B customers start their purchase process online, most usually using a search engine. How many marketing strategy books begin with the importance of search engine marketing? “Conventional” marketing wisdom states that wants became needs and then purchases. Is it not it now true that needs become searches and the results of searches become wants, which lead to more searches and ultimately to purchases? (See above graph).

This interactive marketing approach to strategy means taking into account not only the customer process for finding information but also what the customer is searching for when they search. I recently did a consulting project for a small company and they told me what they were good at, what we would traditionally consider to be a ‘core competencies’ from a marketing point of view. Unfortunately, the search trends on Google Trends indicated that search trends for these products and services were declining. Following a traditional process of identifying core competencies would not take into account what is happening with the consumer online and how they are looking for information. Would you agree as one step in updating how we think about marketing strategy that we need to incorporate digital strategy earlier into the search process?

By Debra Zahay-Blatz.
You can find Debra on Google+ and Twitter as well as LinkedIn.