NEW YORK ? A Mediacom executive at the Mobile Marketing Association?s SM2 conference said that mobile needs to be leveraged from traditional marketing ? such as print ? to surround consumers at every touchpoint.

During the ?Executing against a mobile strategy? session, executives from Pandora, USA Today, Mediacom and Ignited spoke about how they see brands using mobile as part of a comprehensive marketing strategy through their organizations. The session was moderated by Mickey Alam Khan, editor in chief at Mobile Marketer and Mobile Commerce Daily, New York.

?We start with the consumer ? where are they spending time, how are their media habits changing over time and what is the best way that we can connect with them,? said Renee Whittingstall, partner and digital media director at Mediacom, New York.

?I have to work very closely with my counterparts to make sure we are surrounding her in all of those environments, she said. "So from a very traditional print client ? like Revlon ? how do I take that Vogue page that they are doing and make it bigger by surrounding her with the application, by surrounding her with tablet, by surrounding her with mobile and dot-com.

It?s really about taking the audience wherever she is and making sure that we are reaching her at every touchpoint.?

Mobile shopper
A recent study from the Mobile Marketing Association recommended that marketers allocate seven percent of their marketing budgets to mobile.

However, Ms. Whittingstall said that seven percent is a stretch for some brands for a variety of reasons, including a lack of measurement and metrics. Mobile needs to catch up to desktop in terms of reporting and targeting.

For example, being able to see more than just a simple impression is crucial to understanding how consumers engage with a mobile advertisement. Additionally, using multiple screens to connect with consumers can be particularly effective.

Compared to other industries such as entertainment, the consumer-packaged-goods industry has been slower to embrace mobile. However, mobile is also the only device that the target consumers for these products have with them in a store.

For example, drugstore beauty brands can use mobile in-store to help women navigate store aisles. Therefore, in-store campaigns can be particularly effective with smartphones.

Creative assets are a challenge in mobile, per Ms. Whittingstall. For example, a lack of standard ad sizes makes it difficult to persuade a brand to dive headfirst into a mobile campaign. Additionally, back-end tracking needs to be stepped up to have a better grasp on how campaigns perform.

Small budgets
LJ Kobe, New York-based group media director at Ignited said that approximately 2-3 percent of a marketer's budget should be allocated to mobile, depending on the brand, as a way of shifting into doing more with mobile.

In order to get the ad dollars to move, the user experience must be better.

Additionally, ROI expectations need to shift for brands. 

Sales and revenue can be one effective measurement, but brand awareness can also be a measurement of a campaign?s effectiveness.

Although rich media and mobile video can be great ways to incorporate mobile into campaigns, however it needs to be injected into a campaign in a place that makes sense for both the brand and consumer. For example, a mobile ad with a video component can be a great way for entertainment brands to give users a quick look at a trailer or clip for an upcoming TV show.

Cross-media measurement is also a challenge for many marketers to gauge how campaign results across multiple screens.

For a campaign with Clinique for example, the beauty brand used both online and mobile components to promote a line of Chubby Sticks lipsticks. The online experience encouraged users to mix and match different lipstick colors together while the mobile component was more geared at driving sales.

?I want to see cross-platform measurement ? I don?t want to see how Pandora does isolated ? I want to know how it builds on top of everything that I?m doing both from a mobile and tablet standpoint,? Ms. Kobe said.

Targeted advertising
In order to better target campaigns, time and context go a long way, according to Craig Etheridge, vice president of mobile sales at USA Today, Washington.

Additionally, smartphone and tablet campaigns need to be used differently.

Mr. Etheridge said that smartphone users tend to use apps to access quick news stories. These users also tend to consume more content.

Tablet users on the other hand tend to spend longer amounts of time with their devices, especially at night. The company has seen tablet owners spending 30 minutes with the device at night.

?What I truly believe is that you can?t have one complete experience on one medium because you?re not going to reach all of the consumers,? Mr. Etheridge said.

?You can have that engagement for a minute and a half or 30 seconds with the ad ? people are going to recall that information,? he said. "It's like TV ? it strikes emotion."

Final Take
Lauren Johnson is associate reporter on Mobile Marketer, New York