Mobile Marketing - getting from here to there

RCR Wireless News has an opinion piece by Louis Gump, VP Mobile, The Weather Channel Interactive, on the state of mobile advertising. Gump cites the sort of stats that tend to be front and center in such pieces  -- JupiterResearch report predicted that mobile marketing in the U.S. alone will grow to $2.2 billion in 2012, up from $708 million in 2007 -- but moves quickly to the broader and more interesting question of where exactly the industry is today; how do we get there from here?

 

For some answers to that question Gump turned to INmobile, an online community of mobile executives. Snipped from Gump’s piece:

We posed the question where is mobile advertising on its growth curve? The majority of responses indicate that it is still early, but that the growth has begun to be noticeable. Specifically, 54% of respondents say that mobile marketing is an innovative tactic with occasional business impact. Of the rest, 38% say we are in early experimentation only, while 6% feel that it is now a significant platform for leading marketers and 2% say that it is an established part of the marketing mix.

 

There was a broad recognition that some big brands are using mobile to their advantage. However, the rationale for those who feel that we are in the earlier stages believe that many companies have not yet added a line item for mobile in their marketing budgets; the common definition of mobile advertising is broad; and many people are still hungry for metrics.