NEW YORK ? Panelists at ad:tech?s Mobile Mix session made a case for mobile marketing by letting audience members know that it isn?t as hard as everyone thinks it is.

The speakers at ?The State of Mobile Marketing: A Must in the Multichannel Mix? panel all agreed the mobile marketing is no longer a year away, it is here now and is being practiced by Fortune 500 companies.

?The most imp thing that a lot of people lose sight of is the fact that mobile marketing is easy and much easier than it sounds,? said Marcus Startzel, senior vice president of sales at Millennial Media, Baltimore.

Mr. Startzel talked about Coca-Cola?s Fanta campaign and its use of mobile to promote its Search for the Fourth Fantana initiative. It set new records for mobile engagement.

The mobile advertising campaign was able to deliver 15 times more video views than any other national, interactive video campaign (see story).

?Mobile outperforms online,? Mr. Startzel said. ?And, we can track every campaign?s impressions and click-throughs.?

Kristine van Dillen, director of industry initiatives and partnerships at the Mobile Marketing Association said the MMA is working hard to outline how the mobile ecosystem should measure mobile.

?We are working hard to identify the various ad units that can be delivered and figure out how they should be measured,? Ms. van Dillen said.?We are trying to come up with guidelines for mobile banner ad measurement and SMS messages and how valuable the click-throughs are.?

Location-based advertising is a growing area and so the MMA is looking into guidelines for that and also rich media.

SMS is the largest most ubiquitous way to do mobile marketing, according to Matthew Valleskey, head of marketing for mobile services at Neustar, the Sterling, VA-based common short code registry.

Mr. Valleskey said that 1.3 trillion SMS messages were sent in the first half of 2009, just in the United States alone.

?Everyone has a mobile phone and it is always with you and always on,? Mr. Valleskey said. ?And almost of the phones if not all are SMS capable.

?With SMS there is no software to install and no Web needed,? he said. ?The last year or so there has been this huge app craze because of the iPhone, but the iPhone only has like 9 percent marketshare.

If you are looking to do a marketing campaign, make sure you are using and integrating SMS marketing into your overall advertising.?

SMS can be used as a call to action to get consumers to let you provide them with content. SMS also gives legs to other media and makes other channels work harder.

?You can run thousands of different keywords on one short code, but it not a good idea because if one client screws up and the short code gets shut down, then all other clients using the same short code get shut down? Mr. Valleskey said.

There are currently 3,000 short codes in existence, with about 25,000 (give or take) campaigns running on them.

Mr. Valleskey said that the challenge of getting a short code for your brand is the wait time to have it provisioned, which typically takes about 2-12 weeks depending on the carrier.

?If you make a mistake on your application for a short code, the provisioning time could get pushed back and there for so does the campaign,? said Gene Keenan, vice president of mobile strategy at Isobar, San Francisco.

?From an agency perspective, I feel mobile needs better measurement and campaign tools,? he said. Isobar just created an iPhone application for its client Nikon.

It is a very simple application, but is already the No.6 application in the top 20 in Apple?s iPhone App Store.

?Disney has had huge numbers and they spend less than $20,000 per application and once it gets in the top 20 it will stay there,? Mr. Keenan said.

Mr. Keenan also said that Radio Shack is currently pushing an SMS effort in circulars to promote its Black Friday campaign. Consumers sign up to get information on Black Friday merchandise.

Radio Shack is using its existing media and making it work harder through the addition of a mobile component. 

Some brands are getting mobile, according to Mr. Startzel.

Millennial Media conducted a survey of 100 advertising agencies. Sixty percent said they were increasing their mobile ad spending in 2010.

?Executing a mobile display campaign is nearly identical to running a digital display ad,? Mr. Startzel said. ?The networks have scalability and reach.?

Marc-Henry Magdelenat, director of Microsoft Mobile Advertising, Kirkland, WA, said that the mobile industry is at a point where the major brands and retailers understand that it is essential to include mobile in one?s media mix.

He talked about the Discovery Channel campaign that aimed to promote awareness of the ?Deadliest Catch? show.

?Adding mobile to the mix definitely increased the campaign?s results,? Mr. Magdelenat said.
When it comes to mobile Web design, Mr. Magdelenat said that it is important to take the multi-screen approach.

?Consumer browsing a mobile site is not behaving like consumers searching on the Internet," he said.

"The mobile site should be designed with the mobile consumer in mind."
Mr. Keenan said that companies should take the growth of the Web kit browser into consideration. This is going to be the future of the mobile Web.

WAP or mobile site?

The answer is simple. It depends.

?If 99 percent of your target audience is using a smartphone, then definitely leverage the design capabilities for a mobile site,? Mr. Keenan said. ?But if they are using feature phones, then you need to target them in the way that is going to provide them with the best experience.?

Mr. Startzel also talked about the fact that mobile consumers are different than consumer online.

?With a mobile consumer you have their attention for about 4 minutes, so make sure that your site is utility focused,? Mr. Startzel said. ?Think of all the things they would need or want to do with your brand while on the go.?

When it comes to SEO for mobile sites, mobile is different than online. The mobile searcher is searching very differently than then online searcher.

Mobile searchers want instant gratification and online searchers have more time on their hands and are more focused on researching something.

?You have to take into account why the consumer is searching from their mobile phone,? Mr. Valleskey said. ?They are most likely not home.?