Leveraging Your Thought Leadership
This is a short, but useful, overview of how to get started with mobile marketing – that is, communicating with customers and clients via a mobile phone or tablet.
It briefly covers text (SMS) marketing, QR codes, mobile Web sites, mobile apps, and social media. It doesn’t cover any of these topics in depth, but it does provide a good overview for somebody who is new to this kind of marketing.
More and more people are accessing the Internet using their mobile phones and tablets. So how do you make your Web site work effectively when accessed from mobile phones and tablets? Don’t automatically assume you need to create a completely new Web site – or even a phone app – for your Web site. Those might not be the best options, as this cartoon from the XKCD site humorously points out (used with permission):
So what should you do? Broadly, there are three options – from easiest to hardest:
A Web site is “mobile friendly” if it works when viewed on a mobile phone. It means you don’t have to design and maintain a separate site or app; your main Web site just works.
This isn’t as hard as it seems, unless your Web site uses fancy graphic design techniques or complex technology. But if it’s designed well, according to the rules of good, solid Web design, it should work.
Here are some things that could “break” a Web site on mobile devices:
If you have a Web site already, simply load it on as many mobile phones and tablets as possible, and just try reading and clicking your way around as if you were a first-time visitor. If it works well, that’s a good sign. It’s not a 100% guarantee, because there are so many mobile devices now, and you can’t possibly test all of them – but it’s a good start.
Alternatively, if your Web site is built using WordPress, you can install the WPtouch plug-in, which automatically shows mobile users a mobile version of your site (with all the graphics stripped out, and showing just the blog posts and essential pages you want). This is an easy solution, but be warned that it might strip out too much, and you might not like showing users such a bland Web site.
The next option is to create a second Web site, which has been designed specifically for use on mobile phones. The advantage of this approach is that you can create a trim, fast-loading mobile Web site that only offers the essential features; without constraining your main Web site in any way.
However, it does mean you now have to manage and maintain two Web sites. This increases your workload and expense, and increases the risk of the two sites being “out of step”.
Another problem is that the mobile version is sometimes too limited, and is missing some essential features.
The third, and most sophisticated, option is to build an actual mobile app for the Apple iTunes Store and Google Play Store. If you’ve used apps on your phone, you know they can be more powerful than simple Web sites.
However, there are some disadvantages as well, and the biggest is that it’s not a good substitute for your Web site. If your Web site doesn’t load well on a mobile device, it’s unlikely that somebody will think of going to the iTunes Store to download an app! It’s more likely that they will just leave in frustration.
For this reason, most businesses don’t have apps as a replacement for their Web site. If they do want an app that reflects part of their site, they will build a mobile Web site instead (the second option above), and use an app for doing something else related to their business.
If you really want to build an app for your business, contact an experienced app developer. For the iTunes Store in particular, it’s better to use somebody who has done this already, because Apple is very picky about what it will allow for an app.
Earlier this year, I looked at various options for creating an iPhone app. I found an excellent app developer (AppMakr.com), who helped me build an app that appeared in the iTunes App Store. I was thrilled! But not for long …
A few weeks later, the developer informed me Apple had arbitrarily changed their policy, and my app was now going to be rejected! This was after it had been accepted and approved by Apple. We worked diligently to try to meet Apple’s new policy, but eventually it just got way too hard and expensive.
This is the problem with creating an iPhone app: Dealing with Apple.
Well, actually it’s just one of the problems! You also have the delays, the arbitrary approval process, the further delays if you want to change it in the future, and the cost of doing future changes.
The solution is to create your own mobile “mini Web site”, which looks just like an app, but doesn’t have the same limitations.
For example, you can:
Best of all, you don’t have to be a Web designer!
Very easy.
Next Wednesday (14th July), I’m running a 90-minute webinar to show you how to do this step by step. At the end of the webinar, you’ll know how to do everything I’ve shown you in the sample snapshots above. In fact, I’ll create a full “app” right in front of your eyes – just to show you how easy it is.
The webinar is on Wednesday 14th July, from 9.30-11am Perth time. That’s 11.30am-1pm Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane; 11am-12.30 Adelaide; 1.30-3pm NZ.
You also get access to a recording of the webinar. So even if you can’t attend live, you’ll still be able to watch it later.
There are three ways for you to join the webinar:
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