Running a product-based mobile marketing campaign

Mobile marketing doesn’t have to be complicated. With an app and mobile website, it’s easy to extend what you’re already doing on your website and existing social media channels.

Here’s a nice example from one of our most recently launched clients, Hudson Shoes (download their mobile app here).

On Monday they sent out this push notification publicising a new pair of shoes for AW13:

Open up the mobile app from this notification, and here’s what you see on the front page:

A promotional banner on their app which links directly to the relevant product. It’s really quick and easy to upload this within our admin system, and it appears on the app straight away.

But the campaign didn’t end there. Hudson also promoted the same shoe on their Instagram account:

In a marketing email to their database of customers:

And as a banner on their website homepage:

An integrated marketing campaign

This mini-campaign is a great example of an integrated push on a product, extended onto multiple platforms.  Customers get one message from the brand on every channel.

Hudson Shoes have the advantage of high-quality product images, which make relatively easy to create striking promotional banners. This is why getting your images right is so important for fashion brands – they’re your main currency online.

The mobile advantage

A mobile app means you can target your customers right on their phones with a push notification, which is the perfect way to extend your campaign straight to your customer, wherever they are. And as this example shows, your mobile strategy can simply be an extension of your existing website homepage and social media marketing.

We always recommend having an offer, new product, or promotion when sending out a push notification. Once a week is a good guideline, but as with everything else, you should test it and see the results. You can see some advice for sending out notifications here. The Poq admin system makes it simple to send these out.

Here’s why customers love this approach

We know this approach works. Here’s a quote from a consumer interview Poq did. Here we ask about the interviewee’s last shopping experience, and what made it special:

When was the last time you bought a fashion product online?

R:      That was Sunday.  And I bought a dress for the party season from ASOS because I got a notification on my phone from the apps that there was up to 70% off and I also saw it on their Instagram page.  Which is why I clicked through and purchased it and it came today and I love it.

Okay. So what was your experience like when you bought that online?

R:         So obviously I clicked through the link from the Instagram app.  I got a notification and then I, kind of, ignored it but then I went onto Instagram later and saw they’d done some promotional imagery there, so clicked on the link, went through and basically went through to the party season.   And it was quite fun and exciting seeing lots of inspiration.  And then I had a dress in mind that I was looking for, so I was, kind of, going through and when I found it, I was really happy, so I clicked on it and it had it in my size so that was good.  And then I got free delivery as well and obviously I get free returns so I ordered two sizes, just in case.

You can see in this example that the shopper got a push notification from the ASOS app, which planted the seed of an idea in her mind. Although she didn’t buy immediately, when browsing Instagram later (also on her phone) she got another reminder which prompted her to buy.

Adding a mobile element really works to target people directly, and an app is the only way to currently do this using a push notification.

As with everything marketing related, the best way to grow your mobile strategy is to try it out. Test with simple campaigns like this, see what happens, and repeat!