Making the Mobile Connection this Holiday Season and All Year Round. Updated June 2013

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1 Making the Mobile Connection this Holiday Season and All Year Round Updated June 2013

2 Executive Summary The retail world is already ramping up their marketing efforts for the 2012 holiday shopping season. Whether you are a fan of holiday music in September or not, the retail industry knows there is an increasing amount of shoppers that like to get a jump start on their holiday purchases. And, there is a good chance that those shoppers are not only savvy with their pocketbooks, but also with their smartphones setting high expectations for what should be the biggest mobile season yet. Retailers anxiously await the big fourth quarter winter holidays, which according to the National Retail Federation (NRF) include Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa. The shopping season has even expanded from the end of year heavy hitting winter holidays to now include Halloween and Back to School, which is an early indicator of how the winter holidays are expected to fare. While consumers have likely felt the impact of the recession, they will still be spending on holiday purchases. Retailers are in competition for that holiday spending and are taking notice of a major shift in consumers buying tactics. Consumers are incorporating their reliance on mobile devices into their gift purchase strategies. This can be seen through consumers increased awareness and usage of smartphones and tablets for in-store price comparisons, mobile coupon usage, scanning QR codes, and mobile loyalty programs. During the 2012 holiday season, there was a clear divide amongst retailers who followed traditional marketing strategies and those who were tech and mobile friendly. This season it will be more important than ever for retailers to bridge the mobile gap between their brands and consumers. And those who don t embrace the power of the mobile experience will miss the boat. page 2

3 Mobile: The Gift that Keeps on Giving A smart mobile marketing strategy is like the hot new toy that every retailer wants this season. Retailers last year saw 14.6% of all online sessions initiate from a mobile device. This was more than twice the rate experienced in all of In addition, approximately 45% of mobile users compared prices via their handsets during the big Thanksgiving weekend shopping in 2011, up from 20% in This mobile influence led the NRF to forecast 2012 as the Year of the Mobile Shopper. For the 2012 holiday season, retail sales grew by 3% to $579.8 billion from the previous year. Retailers across the spectrum expect to see an increase of in-store mobile comparisons, mobile coupons, and shopping via smartphones and tablets. During the holidays, with escalated levels of browsing and buying, it becomes more likely that consumers will rely on the immediacy, convenience, and ease of use of their mobile devices. In 2012, marketers and retailers spent $6.7 billion on mobile marketing with a projected increase to $19.8 billion by Source: MMA 2013 Integrated Mobile Marketing Strategy Yields Higher ROI Retailers have many mobile marketing tools at their disposal, but they are starting to sit up and take notice of the higher return-on-investment (ROI) they can achieve by implementing mobile as part of their cross-channel marketing programs. In a survey commissioned by Genesys SoundBite and conducted by Luth Research, partner of the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), 52% of mobile marketers stated mobile returns were higher for Mobile Marketing compared to traditional programs, with the average ROI of 32%. As a result, nearly threequarters of the marketers surveyed stated they were increasing mobile marketing budgets and/or shifting budget to mobile from other marketing programs by an average of more than 20%. In that same study, some interesting mobile shopping statistics supported an integrated mobile strategy for the holidays: Mobile coupons get 10 times the redemption rate of traditional coupons 74 million people in the U.S. have opted in to receive text messages from marketers A mobile ad triggers a 43% response rate from consumers using a smartphone. page 3

4 Title Making of Document, the Mobile Myriad Connection Pro, 12 This ptholiday Season and All Year Round Date June Multi-channel communications allow customers to interact with your brand wherever they are. Implementing an integrated mobile strategy as part of a consumer-friendly approach that includes loyalty programs, coupons, QR codes, and mobile websites is essential for retailers this season in order to compete for their piece of the fruit cake. Mobile Enhances the In-Store Customer Experience 90% use smartphone for pre-shopping activities such as finding store location, directions, and hours. 8 in 10 smartphone shoppers use mobile in-store to help with shopping. 70% of all mobile web searches result in action within 1 hour. Smartphone shoppers perfer mobile wesites over apps to search where products are sold, make price comparisons, and find promotional offers Source: Mobile In-Store Research: How in-store shoppers are using mobile devices, Google Shopper Marketing Agency Council, April 2013 Connecting the Dots for Brand Awareness Retailers that connect the dots for consumers between the mobile experience and the in-store or online experience will benefit from building their brands, reaching more consumers, and delivering more information to the hands of ready shoppers. This consumer-centric approach, leveraging mobile in marketing campaigns, can personalize the shopping experience thereby creating a more loyal shopper throughout the year. Mobile also delivers business intelligence from these shopping interactions that can lead to smarter business decisions. In a survey by Luth Research, CMO s responded that Mobile Marketing was especially successful in increasing brand awareness (49%), attracting new customers (38%) and retaining customers (38%). An effective mobile site is a key element of this approach. It allows shoppers to find quickly what they are looking for and take action. Consumers page 4

5 Title Making of Document, the Mobile Myriad Connection Pro, 12 This ptholiday Season and All Year Round Date June now expect a high-quality mobile experience and are frustrated with retailers that do not have mobile sites or ways to shop and interact via the mobile device. For the consumer, this slows down price comparisons, coupon browsing, or just finding a business, often causing them to abandon the search altogether. According to the Interactive Advertising Bureau, mobile-optimized sites get an average of 19 page visits, versus 12 page visits for unoptimized sites. In this tech-forward landscape, retailers are missing a large opportunity if they have not mobilized for a smartphone shopping experience. Building a List, Checking it Twice While retailers know that the holiday season is an opportune time to maximize sales, they can also use this time to lay the foundation for future consumer communications and engagement loyalty by building their mobile databases. All consumers must opt-in or give their express consent to be marketed via the mobile device. Growing a database of opted in mobile consumers interested in interacting with your brand is the gift that keeps on giving. Most effective ways to collect opt-ins: 64% Social media 60% Online promos 45% Source: Luth Research, 2012 The Mobile Database Heightened mobile interactivity and reliance provides retailers with a unique opportunity to create initiatives that build their mobile databases - not just for the holiday season, but for year-round marketing campaigns. Companies cannot simply purchase a mobile phone number list; express consent is required from consumers. The key is to grow that number of subscribers, capturing attributes and unique data points about each customer be it zip code, birthday, or frequency of communications to personalize the experience, and doing so in a secure and compliant fashion. As more consumers actively engage in loyalty programs, leveraging mobile as their channel of choice, the importance for brands to work strategically with a mobile marketing partner is key in making the mobile connection. -Kelly Hlavinka, Managing Partner, COLLOQUY page 5

6 Making the Mobile Connection Growing your subscriber database leads to more scalable mobile marketing campaigns. By incorporating mobile touch points into your existing communications, you can create new mobile-centric programs that leverage your mobile-savvy consumer base, personalize communications based on their activities, and continually refine your programs to increase revenues. The mobile channel is likely to become the most powerful marketing medium. Other marketing communications channels are losing their effectiveness while mobile becomes the alwaysaccessible, converged device. If a consumer received a mobile coupon inside a store, 63% indicated they would be more likely to buy something Source: Chain Store Age, 2013 Keeping the Holiday Spirit Alive Throughout the Year The holidays are a perfect time for retailers to introduce or re-focus their marketing strategies to boost loyalty within their consumer base, increase spend, and enhance the customer experience. Retailers that keep that spirit of innovation and cutting-edge direction throughout the year are the ones that succeed. Smartphone users are doing much more than simply talking on their phones. This presents retailers with loyalty programs tremendous opportunities, with mobile marketing quickly becoming a key ingredient for a successful program. In many cases, mobile marketing is shown to increase average basket size, consumer purchase frequency, brand awareness, and loyalty. And that all translates to increased revenue for retailers. Implementing an effective mobile loyalty program requires six important features: Engagement Relevance Ease of Use Experiential Rewards VIP Treatment Real-Time Delivery page6

7 The Nicely Wrapped Package We ve all taken advantage of the in-store gift wrapping counter. Whether it was for convenience, time savings, or knowing the gift wrap counter will do a better job based on their experience, these same tenets should be kept in mind as retailers build out their mobile marketing programs. Those in charge of implementing mobile programs within their organizations may be apprehensive about where to put their marketing dollars to get the best ROI based on their consumer base, how to effectively personalize the shopping experience for their customers, or how to go about building an opt-in database while addressing security and compliance issues. Working with a knowledgeable and technologically sound mobile marketing provider with the domain expertise to roll out effective mobile programs, leverage best practices, and optimize programs based on results will alleviate these concerns and fast track the retailer to the perfectly wrapped mobile package. And, although the winter holidays are just around the corner, it s not too late to get started. Now is the perfect time to capture the mobile savvy consumers attention, collect opt-ins, and grow your business. By starting now, this can certainly be the most wonderful time of the year. page 7

8 ABOUT US Genesys is a leading provider of customer service and contact center solutions. With more than 3,000 customers in 80 countries, Genesys software directs more than 100 million interactions every day from the contact center to the back office, helping companies deliver fast, simple service and a highly personalized cross-channel customer experience. Genesys software also optimizes processes and the performance of customer-facing employees across the enterprise. For more information visit: or call GENESYS. Visit SoundBite.com for more information page 8