The executives? keynote session, ?Mobile Marketing in a Connected World,? looked at the new business solutions driven by mobile technology and personalized marketing in a connected world.

?Mobile is such a game-changer because it is truly is a one-on-one experience,? said Jim Farley, executive vice president of global marketing, sales and service at Dearborn, MI-based Ford. ?For my 25 years of marketing, I never really had that except at an auto show. 

?The chance to talk to each customer, to know them well enough now with a targeting tool and present that with something that?s really relevant,? he said. ?It puts a higher standard on us as marketers. And for our industry in particular, privacy will be the next important frontier for our company.?

?Within a handful of years we?re going to live in a world where people are suddenly going to have access financial services information, to healthcare, to education, to learning about consumer products,? said Carolyn Everson, vice president of global marketing solutions at Facebook, Menlo Park, CA. 

?It is a fundamentally different world for us to do business in. And companies that are not thinking about the future are going to miss a really big opportunity.?

Ms. Everson noted that although there are more smartphones than toothbrushes, a disproportionately large number of people remain unconnected to the Internet.

Facebook and six mobile phone companies are partners in Internet.org, which aims to bring affordable Internet access to everybody by increasing affordability, increasing efficiency, and facilitating the development of new business models around the provision of Internet access.

Facebook and Instagram together represent 22 percent of all consumers tied through a mobile device. 

?As scary as mobile was for us two and a half years ago when we had to transform the company, I stand here today and say mobile is absolutely the best thing that ever happened to the company because consumers can have it with them at all times,? Ms. Everson said. 

The mobile mind-shift has left Ford scrambling to catch up with consumers.

?I feel Ford is where Facebook was a couple of years ago when they pivoted to mobile,? Mr. Farley said. ?Our company and our product is so associated with independence and now we have this once in a lifetime in our industry to pivot toward mobile.

?It?s not just how we are marketing cars,? he said. ?The most impactful part of the mobile trend for our industry is marketing, but also the experience enhancement. 

?We are so far behind customers? consumption we have to make touch choices. Do we spend our resources catching up on awareness, or selling our product to mobile marketing? Or how much should we invest in the actual experience of that mobile device and your vehicle ownership?

?From my standpoint, there?s no success formula yet,? he said. 

Brands, retailers and marketers are meeting through Wednesday to discuss mobile at MMA?s third annual SM2 conference, part of New York?s Advertising Week events.

Executives from Lincoln Motor, MailOnline and BBC America, among others, will discuss mobile?s role within their organizations? marketing plans during the two-day event. 

More than 40 percent of Ford?s Web traffic comes from mobile devices. Last year, 30,000 vehicle sales started with a lead on a mobile device.

?That?s very large scale for us and it shows that this is a turning point for us,? Mr. Farley said. 

The importance of personalizing ads is reflected in the multitude of ads that potentially could be aimed at consumers.

?What marketer has the best creative ad?? Ms. Everson asked. ?I can?t answer that because it depends on who you?re talking about. What?s relevant to me is going to be different to Jim and different to each one of you in the audience. 

?Every day there are 12 million ads that could be served to people on Facebook,? she said. ?Twelve million options. Each individual has 5,000 to 7,000 ads that might be relevant to them. 

?What we are trying to do is make advertising useful for the people who use Facebook. So every time you go into your news feed you discover something new, perhaps.?