ARCHIVES: This is legacy content from before Marketing Dive acquired Mobile Marketer in early 2017. Some information, such as publication dates, may not have migrated over. Check out the new Marketing Dive site for the latest marketing news.

Marketers need to be updated on mobile privacy, legal issues: panelists

LOS ANGELES ? Mobile is changing everything, but with the constant privacy concerns and legal issues, brands and marketers need to outline their strategy to find the best way to target consumers, according to panelists at the Mobile Marketing Forum.

During the ?Ask the Experts Leadership Panel: A keynote and Open Q&A Session Between the Audience and Industry Leaders session, panelists discussed the current state of the mobile industry. The panel was moderated by Michael Becker, managing director of North America at the Mobile Marketing Association.

?Over the past 5-7 years, we?ve seen so many campaigns and we have seen how they operate,? said Bruce Hersey, director of mobile strategy at Merkle.

?You have to talk about the strategy, your objectives and goals,? he said. ?You have to find out what your marketing strategy is and you have to develop that strategy.?

According to Mr. Hersey, it is important for a brand to look and see what makes sense for them.

From there, brands and marketers can do testing, learn from their mistakes and see what tactics make sense.

?Take SMS for example,? Mr. Hersey said. ?It?s about giving consumers value.

?That?s where the redemption has really come in and what really frames that up is the connected CRM,? he said.

?A lot of times, the mobile database is siloed off somewhere and it?s not connected to that CRM.?

According to the executive, it is important to look at the behavior and habits of that data so that brands and marketers can message consumers with information that is relevant to them.

?That way you would know which tactics and media you need to integrate with,? Mr. Hersey said.

?You have to define a strategy and know what you want to do with mobile,? he said. ?What happens is that brands will start to do things with mobile and not know what to do with it and how to reach consumers and have the right legal information there.? 

Smartphone proliferation
The adoption of smartphones is growing in a very fast pace.

Consumers are no longer in front of their PC when executing different behaviors such as shopping or researching.

Users are increasingly looking to their mobile devices to execute those tasks.

?A big part of mobile is understanding your customers,? said Hans Fredericks, vice president of mobile business development at comScore. ?It has been changing entirely.

?Look at QR codes for example,? he said. ?All of a sudden , the latest things you see in mobile will be a bridge for other media.

?There are certainly some challenges as well ? people are using mobile to look up product information and look up prices and all of a sudden that creates opportunities to make sure that you?re engaged with that consumer.?

Aside from all of the legal phrases and constant mobile marketing guideline updates, now is a great point in time for marketers to build their mobile strategies, per Martin Lange, executive marketing director of digital at OgilvyOne.

?At mobile right now, we?re in a mass inflection point,? Mr. Lange said. ?Look at companies like Google and Facebook who are have a challenge because people are just not trusting them.?

Final Take
Rimma Kats is staff reporter on Mobile Marketer, New York