Considering how technology is constantly improving, it’s no wonder why digital marketing is changing. Today, it primarily reflects on the usage of mobile devices. People use mobile devices for various tasks – from watching all types of media to shopping and communicating with others. When we observe the rise in the number of smartphone users overall, mobile advertising is becoming a perfect cost-effective way to improve business operations. It becomes essential to use this information as a guide to mobile advertising in an effort to adapt to the way consumers are making their purchasing decisions.

Mobile advertising guide

While looking for information to improve your business, you have probably come across the term “mobile advertising”. An obvious way to describe it is to say that mobile advertising focuses on mobile devices, mainly smartphones and other portable devices like tablets. The ads displayed on such devices come in different forms and are distributed over different channels. Generally, some of the most popular mobile advertising methods include:

• Mobile web
• Mobile apps
• Social media ads
• Banner and native apps
• SMS and MMS advertising
• Video ads
• Interactive ads
• Push notifications
• and others.

Basically, they can be, and are, implemented and combined in a way that complies with mobile users’ intentions. These are notably different from their desktop counterparts, considering their searches have much higher intent.

To help you identify the audience and include the suitable format, here is a guide to mobile advertising – the most common methods:

• Advertising with Google
• Location-specific advertising
• Mobile applications and game advertising
• Utilizing social media for mobile advertising

Advertising with Google

One way to advertise is to boost your SEO to improve your traffic organically. This will give you the advantage over others if you manage to win high-ranking positions in search results. However, Google allows you to pay to achieve almost the same thing. This is called PPC (pay-per-click) advertising and Amazon PPC Advertising. It’s a form of internet marketing where you pay only when someone clicks on your ads. Being one of the most popular search engines today, this allows you to appear on their top positions for specific services or products. Using Google ads (Google AdWords), you can easily adjust your PPC efforts and help your business expand. All you have to do is to research relevant and more specific terms for keywords. For example, if you are selling accessories in Newcastle, using “man’s wallets in Newcastle” will be desirable geo and demographically specific term.

Location-specific advertising

A significant focus is placed lately on advertising locally or considering the location. We all know that, if allowed, mobile devices signal the area they are in. This, essentially, enables marketers to target the audience in a particular geographical location. Your ads will be served to anyone in the area you are interested in using GPS positioning. For example, restaurant owners can display their special offers and discounts to people nearby. And if someone uses queries like “near me” or for a particular area, this automatically adjusts the search results to comply with requests.

Mobile applications and game advertising

Many game developing companies are trying to acquire a large player base and monetize their efforts using in-game advertising. Just take a look at the Unity Ads, for example. However, this doesn’t concern only the gaming industry. Overall, a considerable percentage of people use their mobile devices to access various apps. This opens additional opportunities to promote all types of products to the already interested audience.

In most cases, it ranges from all types of video material to small presentations of other apps or products. But, the key point here is to give users something in return so they will be willing to cope with ads. Providing special offers, discounts, or additional currencies like “coins, crystals, energy, or gems” are just some of the examples of how to do it properly. The only downside is that you need to tailor the ads carefully to avoid annoying the users.

Utilizing social media for mobile advertising

It’s not news that social media can be a powerful advertising tool. When they want to improve their brand awareness and increase traffic, many companies apply social media in their marketing strategies. Here is what some of the most popular platforms offer for mobile users.

Facebook

A large portion of Facebook’s efforts focuses on digital marketing for mobile devices. If you want to generate additional leads, you can use Facebook ads to do so. They will monitor the situation, analyze the results, and serve their users with relevant sponsored content. However, the true power comes from the potential that people will share the content further.

Instagram

If you prefer visual representation, then Instagram can be a perfect platform for your mobile advertising. Unlike Facebook who has users of all ages, Instagram is a preferable choice for the younger audience. When your targeted audience includes younger people, you can use the Instagram advertising platform for your marketing. In addition, combining ads with the “Influencers” trend is constantly proving to be a winning combination lately.

Twitter

Because of its nature, Twitter is one of the most popular platforms among mobile users. It’s not only because of the textual context of the content but because a large percentage of “tweets” consists of videos and similar material. It makes running video ads on Twitter highly cost-effective and beneficial. On top of it, your content gets priority in their streams and search results. However, bear in mind that Twitter leans more toward specific maturity groups like most of the other platforms.

There are numerous other social media platforms you can use for mobile advertising. You can use YouTube, Snapchat, LinkedIn, and even places like Reddit and Pinterest for your marketing. Writing about them all, however, goes beyond the scope of the point. One way or another, all these platforms function similarly. But the best part is that, with enough resources, you can use them all.

In the end, you can forget the time when mobile ads were nothing more than a flashy annoyance. All those banners, CTAs, and various pop-ups and static ads now follow strict sets of rules. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be so effective as they are. Hopefully, this guide to mobile advertising will help you decide which popular marketing strategies you can successfully use.

Bio: Robin Baker is a long-time blogger and business enthusiast who enjoys discovering everything digital marketing has to offer. She often shares her opinions and researches and contributes with creative marketing advice on websites like digitaldot.us, helping businesses get better results from their SEO methods.