NEW YORK ? A former executive from The Economist at the 2015 Integrated Marketing Week explained that as marketing evolves further into the digital and mobile space, the control has shifted to the consumer and marketers must be careful not to intrude on user experience. 

As screens are increasingly shrinking and consumers have an abundance of content available to them at any time, marketers must beware of the friction they can cause when entering these new frontiers. It is not difficult for users to move on from content they are uninterested in, so these brands must work at creating the most engaging content that fits consumers? interests or needs. 

"As organizations we have got a hundred plus years of understanding a particular way of communicating out to our consumers," said Alan Press, key media advisor at DDG Knowledge Network. "It is that it is communicating out, it is filling out all the spaces we have been offered, and now we have realtime space and we can just pumping through in all these ways. 

"But what the consumer experience is moving towards is micro interactions, where there is less and less room for brand frictions," he said. "Right now I look at my phone and I probably look at it from anywhere from 30 seconds to 25 minutes at a time. 

"That feels atomized from sitting at my PC all day which is atomized down from sitting in front of the TV for eight hours."

The Integrated Marketing Week was organized by the Direct Marketing Association.

Limited space
Mr. Press detailed how challenging the advertising and publishing fields currently are after technology has fundamentally shifted consumer behavior and the platforms used to the reach them. 

Consumers are constantly using mobile devices and the screens have shrunk significantly compared to desktop and television. This means that advertisers have a physically smaller space to reach viewers, and the chance of interrupting and disturbing the consumer experience is much greater.

 "Now [a mobile device] is going in the pocket and its going to be a glance and a little vibration that indicates something meaningful to me," Mr. Press said. "Every time a brand steps into these spaces as they get smaller and more atomized, the friction that the brand brings with it gets more pronounced.

"A banner ad to the side of your content is less intrusive than an overlay coming up over your content when this is the size screen you have," he said. "So both the size of the actual interaction is getting smaller but also the behavioral context of it is changing really radically, just in time small bits of information and ambient information."

In the eyes of the consumer, the smaller the advertisement on mobile the better, but for marketers this creates a challenge of how to make their content have a lasting impression. If an advertisement is too intrusive, it will create the opposite effect on consumers and can generate a negative image for the brand. 

Advertising content on mobile must be just enough to make an impact, without deterring viewers. 

Attention deficit
Not only is the physical space of advertising shrinking, but also the consumer?s attention span. Marketers today have a much smaller time span of keeping consumers engaged. 

Advertisers have to focus on creating the most attention-grabbing content to keep these consumers interested, in the shortest amount of time. No matter what format of content, whether it is video, image or text, it has to be punctual so that consumers can digest it as quickly as possible. 

Many of these viewers are being targeting while on the go, as mobile is the predominant platform consumers are available on. They are always tuned in, which means your content must stand out along with being noninvasive and efficient. 

"Where does the brand fit when it has be there just there just enough without creating any friction because then it is going to create a negative experience for the consumer, when there isn't a space for it anymore," Mr. Press said. 

"So we are doing a lot of work with our clients and sort of visioning what does the future experience look like," he said. "So they can orient their entire organizations towards something because otherwise you've got a whole bunch of people running."

Final take
Brielle Jaekel is editorial assistant at Mobile Marketer