Study provides insights into mobile marketing

HONG KONG: In order to help brands and marketers identify key market trends, mobile subscriber usage patterns, and success metrics for mobile marketing in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region, the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) last week announced the results of its third-annual APAC Mobile Attitude and Usage Study.

“The APAC region is world-renowned for its high wireless penetration and usage of mobile technologies and the 2007 APAC Mobile Attitude and Usage Study provides some new insights into mobile marketing receptiveness,” said Laura Marriott, president of the MMA. “The study will be available, free of charge, to all MMA members [this] week.”

Consumer mobile usage

The study provides actionable insights into the APAC region's consumer mobile usage by demographic group, awareness and usage of mobile phone features and services, and interest in and concerns about specific applications. Key findings include:

The use of multiple mobile phone features bodes well for acceptance of mobile marketing. Across the APAC region, feature usage is high. Smartphones usage also is high throughout the region, particularly in China and India, giving mobile marketers additional options for developing and executing campaigns.
Roughly half of APAC mobile users express at least moderate interest in mobile marketing, and 13% indicate high interest. The immediacy of the information and convenience of the service are perceived as its greatest benefits.
Of the countries surveyed, the greatest potential is in India and China, followed by Hong Kong. Furthermore, more users in these countries already have participated in such programmes.
Text messaging usage is high: more than 60% of the region's uses. This usage translates into a large addressable audience for SMS-based marketing campaigns.
Regardless of country or age, users are more likely to have experience with sweepstakes/voting and receiving information about new products than with other mobile marketing applications. Applications of interest to the greatest number of potential users are mobile coupons, status alerts about accounts or purchases, alerts on special sales and sweepstakes.
Greatest barriers to acceptance include lack of need, fear of intrusiveness and cost concerns, trends consistent with other markets of the world.

The 2007 Mobile Attitude and Usage Study was conducted by Synovate, a global market research firm, on behalf of the MMA. Synovate conducted 1901 online interviews in October 2007 which looked at mobile usage in China, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Japan and Australia. The MMA has also conducted similar studies in the US and Western Europe.

"This study confirms the attractiveness of the Asia Pacific region for mobile marketing activities. The size of the market is large and mobile phone users are receptive to this application of the technology," said Brendan Shair, executive director in Synovate's Hong Kong office. "As seen in the US, the youth market (18 – 34) is particularly attractive for mobile marketers, given this segment's high dependency on their mobile phones."

Latest US guidelines

The MMA also released the latest edition of its Consumer Best Practices (CBP) Guidelines for Cross-Carrier Mobile Content Services in the US on Tuesday, 11 December 2007. Updated twice annually, the CBP is a set of rules for cross carrier mobile content services in the US. The guidelines may be downloaded at www.mmaglobal.com/bestpractices.pdf.

For more information on the MMA, go to www.mmaglobal.com.