Mobile marketing has reached a stage where service providers, ad networks and agencies need to cross the street to chat to players in interactive and direct marketing.

Reading this publication should convince most industry observers and experts that many Fortune 1000 companies are already dabbling in some form of mobile marketing or the other. Maybe they don't have full-blown mobile marketing campaigns, but the ones they do run are creative, eye-catching and ROI-focused.

So the awareness of mobile marketing is quite high, at least among the upper echelons of Corporate America.

However, there is a problem at the middle-management level -- a critical tier on whom rests the execution of marketing campaigns, from television and mail to online and mobile. It is this layer that needs more convincing since they answer to their superiors for ROI. Just imagine the pressure they're under in this economy where consumer spending is constrained and media coverage negative day in, day out.

A good place for mobile marketing experts to start is engaging with these mid-ranking managers in their stomping grounds for networking, prospecting and education: trade shows.

Now there is no dearth of trade shows in the wireless industry. In fact, one of the complaints of this business is that there are too many trade shows and conferences. But most of those events are for preachers preaching to the converted. What mobile marketing specialists need is to go beyond their comfort zone.

Show and tell
Several marketing events come to mind. Take ad:tech, for instance. It is the leading multi-city, global event franchise for interactive marketing specialists and online advertising executives.

A typical ad:tech in New York or San Francisco attracts upwards of 10,000 executives and hundreds of exhibitors, ranging from Yahoo, Google, Microsoft and a virtual Who's Who of interactive advertising and marketing.

Ad:tech is where mobile marketing service providers and agencies need to be. This is where they expose their expertise, services and products to marketers and potential partners who are looking to extend their computer Internet marketing efforts to mobile. But it's safe to say that not too many interactive marketing executives know their way around mobile.

The next ad:tech is Aug. 5-6 in Chicago. An estimated 50 exhibitors from the interactive side have signed up to exhibit at this year's event at the picturesque Navy Pier. Expect a couple of thousand marketers from the Midwest and elsewhere to show up. A few mobile companies have taken tables or booths, including Cellit, NeuStar, Mobile Messenger and this publication.

In addition, ad:tech Chicago will also run a couple of mobile marketing sessions, one on real-world examples from Fox and Wall Street Journal executives and the other on mobile and local search. The two panels were put together in conjunction with the Mobile Marketing Association.

Associations matter
But that's next month. There's the Interactive Advertising Bureau's first mobile event coming up July 21 in New York. It is called the IAB Leadership Forum: Mobile.

The IAB is the nation's preeminent organization for Internet advertising standards and self-regulation. Its first mobile event is an acknowledgment that mobile is an integral part of the interactive marketing experience. It is no surprise, then, that comScore, Yahoo and ESPN have sponsored workshops to showcase their mobile expertise.

What is even more encouraging are the sponsors in the hour-long Ad Network Marketplace: Google, Medio Systems, JumpTap, Yahoo, Ad Net, AdMob, Millennial Media, Transpera, Rhythm NewMedia, Nokia, Platform-A/ThirdScreen Media, 4Info, Greystripe, Smaato and 5th Finger.

These sponsors understand the importance of educating interactive marketers and service providers -- the companies that dominate the growing online advertising industry. They understand that it is only a matter of time before the distinction between the mobile Internet and the computer Internet disappears.

An equally important player in this space is the Direct Marketing Association. The DMA shares many members in common with the IAB and many attendees with the numerous ad:tech shows.

A key specialty of DMA conferences is the education element. The expo side of its shows is chockfull of the key players in the direct marketing space. Their clients are among the nation's biggest marketing spenders -- retailers, catalogers and ecommerce companies.

So why not get in front of that audience, especially at DMA08 in Las Vegas Oct. 11-16? The holidays will be right round the corner and who knows, mobile companies might succeed in convincing some retailers to add a mobile component to their CRM/database marketing efforts (see story).

This year marks the first time that the DMA will have a mobile marketing pavilion -- an idea pinched from ad:tech. It makes sense for mobile companies that stress the ROI component of their channel to be at the altar where ROI is worshipped.

If mobile marketing has to gain wider acceptance as a targeted, yet mass medium, it needs to make the case to marketers that understand the twin concepts of interactivity and ROI in their marketing drives. The future of marketing is interactive and direct, and mobile is part of both mediums. So, fish where the fish are.