The growth of the mobile channel fuelled by smartphones and tablets is the single most important trend affecting digital marketers, according to a new report.
The first Quarterly Digital Intelligence Briefing, based on a survey of 900 businesses, by Econsultancy and Adobe, identifies a range of marketing trends and looks at the impact they are having on businesses.
More than three-quarters (79%) of companies taking part in the global Econsultancy survey said the proliferation of devices such as smartphones and tablets was significant for their organisations, including 38% who said it was “highly significant”.
But the research also found that many companies are not yet measuring the mobile channel effectively.
Almost two thirds of respondents said they believed it was important to measure the value of traffic from mobile devices (65%) and differences in behaviour between mobile and other visitors (63%). However, less than a quarter of companies are measuring these areas (24% and 21% respectively).
Econsultancy Research Director Linus Gregoriadis said: “Consumers are embracing the mobile channel but companies are lagging behind when it comes to effective measurement.
Engagement through mobile devices can provide a wealth of important intelligence which many companies are ignoring.”
The report also looks at the importance of “earned media” from social media marketing, which 34% of companies regard as a highly significant trend.
As with the mobile channel, the report found that most companies are failing to measure the value of traffic from social media even though the vast majority of respondents regard this as an important metric.
Neil Morgan, Senior Director, EMEA Marketing, Adobe, said: “It is encouraging to see how the vast majority of companies recognise the importance of engaging appropriately with social media and the opportunities for marketing themselves through social channels.
“The disparity between the importance attached to the social space, and the actual measurement of it suggests that companies are still getting comfortable with their social strategies and working out ways of defining success.”
Two versions of the first Quarterly Digital Intelligence Briefing are available, showing separate data for Europe and North America survey respondents.
The figures above show the data for the global survey. Below is a breakdown of these figures for Europe and North America separately.
Europe
• 36% of European businesses surveyed said the proliferation of devices (including smartphones and tablets) was highly significant, while 42% said this was quite significant.
• 60% of businesses said that measuring value of traffic from mobile devices is important, while 62% said differences in behaviour between mobile and other visitors was important to measure. The proportion of European companies measuring these areas is 23% and 20% respectively.
• 31% of European businesses say that social media marketing (earned media) is a highly significant trend, while a further 53% say it is quite significant.
• The social media metrics most widely regarded as important are brand sentiment (65%) and value of traffic from social media (71%). Only 25% of European businesses are measuring brand sentiment, while even fewer (17%) are measuring value of traffic from social channels.
North America
• 39% of North American businesses said that the proliferation of devices was highly significant, while the same proportion (39%) said this was quite significant.
• 79% of North American businesses said that measuring value of traffic from mobile devices is important. Around two thirds (67%) said that differences in behaviour between mobile and other visitors was important. The proportion of North American companies measuring these areas is 28% and 27% respectively.
• 34% of North American businesses say that social media marketing (earned media) is a highly significant trend, while a further 45% say it is quite significant.
• The social media metrics most widely regarded as important are brand sentiment (81%) and value of traffic from social media (91%). Around half (49%) of North American businesses are measuring brand sentiment, but only 31% are measuring value of traffic from this channel.
The full report is available on the Econsultancy website here.
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