NEW YORK ? Kraft Foods and Bank of America executives revealed their strategies for driving adoption of their applications through mobile advertising.

Mobile marketing companies Apptera and Medialets rounded out the panel. Moderater Alan Warms, founder/CEO of Appolicious Inc., Chicago, asked the panelists how to drive adoption, integrate promotion and ensure that a brand?s application rates highly against the competition.

?When we set out to do the iFood Assistant app, it wasn?t for any specific branding or advertising initiative, it was to connect with consumers in a meaningful and relevant way and make their life more delicious,? said Ed Kaczmarek, director of innovation and new services at Kraft Foods, Northfield, IL.

Kraft Foods is the largest food and beverage company headquartered in the United States and the second-largest in the world.

Oreo - a Kraft Foods brand - tapped the mobile channel for a promotion meant to drive awareness of the cookie brand among British consumers (see story).

The company aslo has an iPhone and iPod touch application called iFood Assistant that offers consumers access to food and meal-planning ideas (see story).

Kraft Foods expanded its reach of consumers through the launch of a new mobile Web site, which was promoted via mobile search and banner ads on Yahoo's Web portal (see story).

?We wanted to bring our brand closer to consumers at the point of purchase, and the iPhone and iPod touch are superior devices to engage consumer in a meaningful way,? he said.

To promote the application, Kraft launched a cross-channel effort that included print, email, online, social media and mobile.

The brand tapped AdMob and Millennial Media for its mobile advertising campaign designed to drive downloads of the iPhone application.

?The most effective channels were word of mouth and mobile,? Mr. Kaczmarek said. ?It surprised us that in-app advertising was one of the most successful vehicles to drive downloads of our app.?

Banking on mobile
Adoption of Bank of America?s mobile banking services has been strong, with more than 3 million active users, which it claims is more than any other financial institution.

In the month of August, Bank of America initiated more than 600,000 locator sessions to find the nearest ATM or branch using their handsets.

In one year, 2 million consumers have downloaded the Bank of America iPhone application. The bank has applications for RIM?s BlackBerry and Google?s Android as well.

?Our mobile banking application strategy is based on the fact that consumers want to be in touch with their finances, which is a very basic need,? said Jen McDonald, digital marketing executive at Bank of America, Charlotte, NC. ?Because of the size and scale of our customer base, we have customers interacting with us thousands of times per second.

?It was important for us to provide a relevant, useful, simple and satisfying experience at all touchpoints,? she said. ?Soon mobile will become the channel of choice for banking, so naturally we built a mobile strategy.

?Mobile is seeing significantly higher usage compared to other channels.?

Earlier in the week, another Bank of America executive said that mobile ad campaigns have in some cases doubled the response rates achieved by online campaigns during a panel at Mobile Ad Summit (see story).

?We use targeted mobile advertising to reach our audience, targeting primarily by device type, which has been very successful, with huge click-through rates,? Ms. McDonald said. ?More than 50,000 app downloads have been driven directly by mobile banners.?

Year of mobile
It would not be a mobile conference without a discussion of whether or not this is the year of mobile.

?Mobile marketing has caused a sea change in how brands interact with consumers,? said Henry Vogel, president/CEO of Apptera, San Bruno, CA. ?I believe that this is the year of mobile marketing, because marketers and futurists have been talking about mobile marketing for some time, but today consumer adoption lets us impact a large numbers of consumers in a meaningful way.

?Apps are a part of that, not the whole story, but a truly fundamental part of mobile marketing,? he said. ?Being in the app environment is a no-brainer to break through the clutter and get high-response rates.

Why mobile? For one, it has the broadest reach in terms of adoption, with more than 3 billion handsets worldwide and 275 wireless subscribers in the U.S.

?Mobile is integrated into everyone?s daily life, it?s personal, portable and persistent, it?s interactive and engaging, it?s measurable and offers rich targeting,? Mr. Vogel said.

Apps featuring rich-media ads
While click-through rates for low-end static banners tend to average 1 percent or so, interactive banners can range as high as 9, 10 or 11 percent.

The differentiation of the ad unit makes a big difference. Originality can made an ad stand out.

Levi?s Dockers brand tapped Medialets to create the first interactive "shakable" mobile advertisement within a custom-built ad network of iPhone applications (see story).

The campaign yielded a 33 percent response rate and the time of engagement averaged 42 seconds (see story).

In-app advertising is effective at driving downloads of other applications. The iPhone provides an excellent platform for rich-media ads.

?You want to deliver the message in the medium where people are going to be consuming similar media,? said Eric Litman, chairman/CEO of Medialets, New York. ?Mobile advertising is the best way to drive downloads of apps?it?s by far the most successful mechanism.

?We help our clients find a way to create ads that reach through to consumers by delivering everything from limited versions of the app within the ad to showcase the user experience to  video or audio to help the app stand out,? he said.