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Low Ad Recall but High Response for Location-Based Services

By mike, May 07 in blog with 0 comments

Mobile location-based services provide a variety of functions, including maps, navigation, friend finders and store locators. According to a study from Luth Research and the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), more than one-quarter of US mobile phone users have used a location-based service, and 10% do so at least weekly.

Users of mobiles ages 25 to 34 were the demographic most likely to use location-based services at least once a week, at 22%. iPhone users also came in above average, with 63% using the services weekly. The most common activities were finding nearby points of interest, including stores, locating the user on a map and using navigation services.

Advertisers may not be taking advantage of the opportunities offered by such utilitarian services. A scant 9% of monthly location-based services users said they had noticed ads at least one-half of the time. In contrast, 35% of mobile Web browsers remembered seeing adds most of the time, as did 25% of mobile information searchers.

But among those location-based services users who did see ads, nearly one-half (48%) took action. Only 37% of SMS ad viewers and 28% of mobile Web ad viewers said the same.

“Consumers believe location-based services offer them significant benefits in functionality and relevance,” said Peter A. Johnson, vice president of market intelligence, MMA, in a statement. “Consumers’ significant adoption and appreciation of location-based services opens up enormous new opportunities for brands and agencies to leverage this unique virtue of the mobile channel.”

In Q1 2009, Brightkite found just 4.3% of non-iPhone users and 15.4% of iPhone users recalled seeing mobile ads on location-based services, indicating the ads may be somewhat more prevalent in 2010. A January 2010 survey from R2integrated found that nearly one-fifth of North American marketers planned to use location-based campaigns this year, but that could include non-advertising marketing components.

About the author

Mike Andrew has been working with the Internet and small business for over 12 years. Mike has been a keynote speaker at conventions and seminars and conducted social media training sessions all over the world. Mike has an extensive media background having worked in electronic media for over 30 years. Mike specialises in social media and Internet marketing strategy, SEO techniques and search engine marketing campaigns. His articles appear on numerous blogs around the web as well as national magazines.