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The sheer number of promotional mobile marketing campaigns is mind blowing and the number grows on a daily basis. However, there is a disconnect between these promotional efforts and what should be the ultimate goal, driving sales for the clients business. Traditional promotional campaigns are often justified as a brand awareness effort, as it can be difficult to measure the effectiveness of sports marketing, television commercials, guerilla stunts, contests, and the like. As marketers, we need to realize that the mobile phone now offers a response mechanism that enables compelling engagement opportunities and detailed metrics for efforts that were formerly static experiences with little, if any, opportunity for measurement.

Whatever the end goal of your campaign (sales, email newsletter sign-ups, product sampling, etc.), the mobile phone provides the only truly immediate means to engage with a brand in response to a marketing message. Whether it’s in-stadium events, television, print, etc., including a text call-to-action makes sense.

Imagine watching a car commercial on television and you are impressed with the vehicle and would like to learn more, but you aren’t going to jump off the couch immediately to do research online. Wouldn’t it be great if you could text CARNAME to SHORTCODE and receive a response asking for your email address or a link to a WAP (mobile Internet) site? Great, you’ve caught my attention, I’ve responded, and now the information is waiting in my email for when I’m ready to take a look. From the marketers’ perspective, there is a goldmine of information to be had as well. This can be done in a number of ways, including tracking by unique keywords, mobile phone area code, and comparing spikes in requests to specific marketing events or media placements.

In the not-too-distant future, it will be difficult to believe that we once spent millions of dollars on marketing campaigns that were one-sided affairs with no way for the prospect to respond to the message we spent so much trying to communicate.