Marketing a Mobile App Through Offline Means

Smartphones are mostly used in offline situations, are they not?

With the mobile app world becoming increasingly competitive, it might be time to re-think your mobile app strategy. Mobile app marketing, unlike online marketing requires a different train of thought. Mobile apps are most effectively marketed offline because most people use their mobile phones in offline situations.

Barcodes have become another medium to interact with consumers in a shopping situation, and some apps have taken advantage of this, like StickyBits, which is integrating discussion, reviews and rewards.

ShopSavvy's incredibly popular app was built on comparing online prices to in-store (offline) prices with product reviews.

Nothing might hit bigger in mobile though than the transition of the traditional coupon to mobile. Early studies have suggested that mobile coupons are 10x more effective because they are right on your phone.

Aisle411 (a grocery store and big box store app) combined some of the latter trends into their mobile app by serving grocery and home-center shoppers. They made shopping easy with product location assistance, shopping lists, coupons and product reviews, all while you're in the store. You can search for a product in-store and find its location, upload a shopping list and the app will produce a map of where to find the items, you'll be able to find which coupons you can redeem that day, and what shoppers are saying about the product! You can also participate in a real-time in-store discussion through the app.

This brilliant app combines mobile, product reviews, coupons, search, location, a shopping list, barcode scanning, and real-time discussion.

But it comes as no surprise that it's difficult to market these apps:

a) It is difficult to navigate the sea of available apps

b) There is still that challenge of where to "engage" the consumer- online or offline

In AdAge's "Building Brands Whitepaper", Richy Glassberg, a 14-year marketing veteran says: "You can't get a branding message in a standardized unit". He would further go on to say on offline marketing methods- "When we standardized units, we didn’t go for full-size. What we’re left with is trash and trinkets. Think of it: in both TV and print, ads interrupt the flow of content.”

While McLoughlin has consistently created value for clients with what Glassberg called trash and trinkets, he's correct in realizing the drastic change in offline marketing that is beginning to happen- where promotional products become sources and vehicles of media. Glassberg is also correct in assuming that you can't get a branding message in a standardized unit- here at McLoughlin we have to customize every promotion- never is it the exact same.

If Aisle411 wants to target a market that is female and is the "gatekeeper" or the family shopper from the ages of 25-60, they will have to be where they are. Event in-store marketing, gureilla marketing and malls will be some of the ways to get the mobile app and brand out to the masses.  With positive reviews, the target market will tell all their friends! Once Aisle411 is where the consumer is, the promotional product can be the trigger to action for downloading the app.

Promotional products are becoming forms of media- you can print a website link or a digital barcode on a product that will lead the target market to downloading mobile app. In order to download a mobile app, you must use your smartphone. People predominately carry smartphones with them in offline situations.

Yes, it might be offline marketing's last effective stand in the minds of some industry veterans, but it might be what works as more than half of North America is expected to own a smartphone by some point in 2011....

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