Q&A with Mickey Alam Khan

It’s a new year, and today we’re debuting a new feature at Mobile Demystified: Guest Bloggers!

First up is our friend Mickey Alam Khan, editor-in-chief of Mobile Marketer. We wanted to get Mickey’s take on the mobile marketing space, and this email Q&A ensued.

WATERFALL MOBILE: Have any products or brands used mobile in a way that you’ve found to be especially smart or effective?

MICKEY ALAM KHAN: We find most brands in the apparel, travel, media, entertainment, retail and consumer packaged goods sectors get mobile. Their use of mobile banner ads for brand-building and engagement, SMS for loyalty programs, store drives and discounts, and applications for everything from information to shopping and transactions is transforming the use of mobile. The triumvirate of mobile Web, SMS and applications are ideal for brands with a decent mobile budget.

WM: Waterfall Mobile noticed a lot more major consumer brands activating their traditional media (TV, radio, print) with mobile calls to action in the second half of 2009. Have you observed this trend? What do you make of it?

MICKEY: The major trend we noticed last year was how mobile calls to action were increasingly integrated with other media such as television, radio, print and out-of-home. It indicates that marketers are wise to the chief benefit of mobile: driving traffic to other channels, or giving legs to other media. No medium can succeed on its own, and mobile is no different in this regard. SMS is the best tool to drive traffic to stores for discounts or sales. Similarly, applications are the perfect vehicles to deliver the latest deals or offers from the brand. And mobile Web sites are perfect for store locations, search and price-comparisons while out and about.

WM: Mobile applications get a lot of ink right now, but statistically far more people are using SMS. Do you think brands are buying into the hubbub (having an iPhone app for the sake of having an iPhone app) at the expense of more effective mobile messaging options?

MICKEY: Each mobile channel has its use. To convince a consumer to not only download the application but also regularly use it means that the loyalty battle has been won in that case. But there is no disputing that SMS is the most ubiquitous form of mobile advertising and marketing. It is low-tech and affordable, and is a language that every consumer understands. SMS is ideal for driving consumers to stores, and for delivering alerts, discounts, coupons and news of store openings and sales. Also, SMS is available on 99 percent of mobile phones in the marketplace.

WM: Mobile marketing ROI is an evergreen topic of discussion. How far do you think the industry is from uniform ROI metrics? Do the benefits of mobile outweigh any lingering questions of how to exactly calculate ROI?

MICKEY: We are on our way to getting uniform mobile metrics.

The Mobile Marketing Association has made great strides in this area. Besides, there shouldn’t be much trouble tracking mobile performance. Response to SMS is easily tracked at point of sale or via interactions, mobile Web banner click-throughs are recorded and application use data is easily accessible. So it is a myth that mobile can’t be measured for its ROI. Why isn’t the same question asked of television or print? Who knows how many people actually saw a commercial or read an ad? Mobile is way more measurable than the guesswork passing for metrics in TV and print.