The importance and effectiveness of mobile advertising

The role that smartphones play in the daily lives of consumers is no more under discussion: mobile devices are not only communication devices any more, but they have become "always on" companions for people in everyday life. Few statistics on this phenomenon:

• There are more than 1 billion monthly active users of Facebook mobile, corresponding to about 79% of its total users worldwide
• Mobile services such as messaging apps, the most popular in terms of growth, registered a 203% usage increase in 2013
• Health and fitness apps usage has grown exponentially since 2013, reporting a 62% increase over the past 6 months, and 3 million patients worldwide are expected to be using remote healthcare monitoring devices based on smartphones to transfer information by 2016

(Source: http://digitalmarketingmagazine.co.uk/mobile-digital-marketing/the-significance-and-growth-of-mobile/806)

The objective of marketers is to drive sales, and mobile devices are increasingly becoming an integral part of this process. So, how can advertisers take advantage of this, developing mobile campaigns that appeal their customers and move them directly to a purchase decision?
The key is to convey the right message, to the right audience at the right time. Invasive and irrelevant advertisements only annoy users, so marketers should try to create content-rich ads and to show them to a specific target audience, before people are actively engaged in an activity (e.g., while an app is uploading). Moreover, showing pictures and text is not enough any more to really engage customers: click-to-call or click-to-download, geolocation, and the use of smartphones features such as the calendar, are some examples of how to enrich the content of an ad and make it more engaging for customers.

Source: http://digitalmarketingmagazine.co.uk/mobile-digital-marketing/how-to-ensure-the-pounds-follow-the-eyeballs-when-it-comes-to-mobile-advertising/808