I know I have written to you about mobile advertising before, but I’m not sure you really understand how important it is and how much more important it’s becoming. Almost everyone now has a smartphone or tablet, and they use them sometimes more than they do their desktop or laptop computers. 
If you have a mobile device, you know how important it is to you. But let me ask you… Have you ever bought anything from a mobile ad?
You may be shaking your head, but listen up! According to Silicon Valley’s Mercury News, in an article entitled, “Internet, mobile advertising revenues established records in 2012,” from
“The report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers said that mobile ad revenue more than doubled from the previous year to $3.4 billion. It accounted for 9 percent of total Internet ad revenue in 2012.”
Yes, you read it right. Mobile ad revenues more than doubled!
YOU NEED TO THINK ABOUT MOBILE ADVERTISING NOW!
Can I stress that enough? Aside from a presence on the World Wide Web, your business needs to have a mobile version of its website, and this is especially important if you have an e-commerce store. However, it’s also a big deal if you’re running with one or two products. People need to be able to a) see your site easily on a mobile device and b) be able to click a button and buy your products. Without those capabilities, you’re probably losing sales.
Now, it’s OK to use Jetpack by WordPress for creating a quick WordPress mobile site. If you go to this site on the Web, you’ll see it creates a nice, clean mobile version. But I can’t sell things! I really don’t sell from this site, so that’s OK, but even if you’re an author with a book to sell, Jetpack won’t do the job for you.
Where to Advertise?
Mobile ads aren’t as hard to place as you might think. Google has a couple of platforms that you can use. There’s the standard “Search Ads,” which are exactly the same as Google AdWords search advertising, which places your ads on sites in or related to your niche.
But there’s also AdMob, which allows you to place banners and other types of advertising. The minimum spend here is $50, which gets a LOT of impressions. I ran an ad back in 2010 (yes, I know it’s been a while, but hang on… I have another site I like), and got 249,337 impressions. The click-through rate was low at 0.12%, but that translates to almost 300 new visitors, who are already targeted to my ad. Right? For $50, that’s amazing.
However, I was advertising as an affiliate. The ad wasn’t mine. When I was heavy into affiliate marketing, this worked great for me, but that’s no longer my focus, as you well know.
That said, the reason I haven’t advertised at AdMob for such a long time is because I got better results via InMobi, which is not a Google site. I ran another $50 ad and got 700 optins for a “getting started” type free video page where people could go to learn about Internet marketing.
Though I don’t advise you to get optins this way because they’re very cold, and not all of them will be responsive, it’s still a great way to advertise inexpensively. Hundreds of mobile users will see your ad, and you can load up your account and set a daily budget, so you don’t break your bank.
Here are your objectives for the week
- Get a mobile version of your website. You may have to pay around $500 or more and a monthly charge for maintenance and hosting, but it’s going to be SO worth it. (If you’re only pushing content, JetPack works fine and it’s free.)
- Once the site is ready to go, run your first mobile ad. You can create your own banners or have a graphic designer do them for you, but get people used to seeing your brand. When you do, you may start to see just how important mobile advertising is becoming.
If you need someone to build a mobile site for you, we can help! Just contact us through our contact page or give us a call. (The number is to your right.) We’ll be happy to help you!
