As mobile adoption booms, firms are finding new ways to monitor and monetize usage
China enters the mobile era Image: Jonas Forth |
"100 years ago, the automobile became a symbol of the American industrial revolution. Today, mobile internet is transforming how and where people work, live, interact and consume in China", stated SY Lau, President of Tencent Online Media Group at a recent marketing forum in Singapore.
Indeed, China has already overtaken the US in terms of mobile internet users, penetration and access to social media.
On June 18th, TMall ran a promotional campaign and sold over 1m mobile phones in less than 24 hours.
The big challenge for marketers is realising the difference between mobile and conventional online advertising and learning how to integrate mobile access into their current offerings.
According to Lau, Chinese spend 40% of their online time on a mobile platform, which is changing the way advertisers interact with consumers. Traditionally advertisements would simply encourage consumers to purchase their products by educating them about their benefits.
Now, with a host of data about consumers' locations, shopping habits and individual tastes readily available, the onus is on marketers to actively recommend tailored products and services.
In Lau's words, brands must strive to be "enablers", helping mobile users interact with their surroundings. Apps like DidiDache, which allows users to summon taxis and pay for them through their phones, and dining apps that recommend restaurants in the users vicinity that meet their predesignated criteria, are thriving.
Tencent recently launched a campaign in conjunction with Mercedes-Benz that enabled it to offer auto sales through its popular Weixin platform. In just three minutes, 388 smart cars were sold, 1,751 down payments were made and 6,677 sales queries were generated.
Deng Hui, manager of big-client business at Google China, said that marketers were doing more to "translate mobile traffic into actual sales and accurately assess the value of the traffic" through its adwords service. Although Google holds just 12% market share of China's search engine segment, compared to Baidu's 81.7%, it is relying on sophisitcated mobile adoption to help it regain a presence in the region.