We used to ask ourselves if mobile marketing mattered, keeping in mind it wasn’t a physical territory or an inhabited one. Today, this realm has become an absolute truth.

Technology, or more specifically, mobile phones and their access to the internet, have fully mutated the average person’s routine, both in the way they communicate and the way they receive information. Obviously this has also changed their relationship with brands and businesses.

Before taking a look at the statistics regarding consumer behavior and their various mobile devices, let us propose a self-analysis: When you wake up do you check your phone even before brushing your teeth? Can you finish your daily meals without checking your phone? Before going to sleep, do you give a last look to your different apps?

While you think of the answers, let’s check some facts:

• 223.9 million Latin-Americans will have, or use, a smartphone in 2017¹

• 93% of cellphone owners check and use it during their first waking hour²

• 87% of millennials admit they have their smartphones with them day and night³

It’s undisputed that people are continuously growing more and more connected and dependent on their devices. Even navigation screens that used to be horizontal on desktops, have now become vertical. According to an analysis from StatCounter, as of October 2016, mobile web browsing has officially surpassed browsing on a desktop. Desktop now counts for about 48.7% of traffic while mobile browsing accounts for 51.3%⁴. This explains why brands and businesses must be alert and thinking about how they can make themselves relevant in the less than 30 cm that separate a consumer’s eyes and the screen.

According to Google’s micro-moments, the average person checks their cellphone about 150 times a day. At all of those touchpoints, brands battle with how to make an experience more relevant for the user. This explains the importance of knowing who’s on the other side of the mobile screen and using data to create personalized messaging. As opposed to offline mass media that is designed for, and delivered to, passive users, mobile marketing gives advertisers the opportunity to completely change an individual’s behavior. As consumers, we can now be more autonomous in the way we tune-in and interact with the content we receive.

More than 82% of Latin Americans search for information about products and/or services online, and 43% research items they are thinking about purchasing on the internet first before physically purchasing in a store⁵. No other media is so close, and so present, in the buying decision process.

These are the moments where digital and mobile marketing should appear and are so crucial. These are the micro-moments where brands need to begin their communication plans and digital strategies, and most importantly – start thinking mobile first.

According to Emarketer, in 2016⁶, mobile ad spend accounted for 29.4% of total digital investment in Latin America. With the amount of Latin Americans engaging with mobile devices, the percentage of investment in mobile is certainly too low, even more so if we compare it with the numbers spent on traditional offline media.

It’s hard to understand how so many brands still haven’t adopted mobile marketing – even with the constant growth seen over the past decade or so. The screen may be small, but mobile devices don’t need size to show us its strength in transforming the industry. In a consumer’s hands mobile marketing can move the masses, from all generations, defying the market while reinventing itself constantly.

Sources:
1 eMarketer Report Mobile Latin America 2016: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru
2 Multi Device – Ipsos, Q3 2015 – investigation commissioned by Facebook / Global Mobile Consumer Trends 1st edition, Deloitte / Connected shoppers, investigation commissioned by Facebook, 2015
3 https://think.storage.googleapis.com/images/micromoments-guide-to-winning-shift-to-mobile-download.pdf
4 https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/nov/02/mobile-web-browsing-desktop-smartphones-tablets
5 Connected shoppers, investigation commissioned by Facebook, December 2014 / January 2015: Mexico, Argentina, Colombia.
6 https://www.emarketer.com/Report/Mobile-Latin-America-2016-Argentina-Brazil-Chile-Colombia-Mexico-Peru/2001797