More and more people are carrying around tiny computers more powerful than the lunar module that landed on the moon in their pockets,
and they’re doing more with them than ever before. The technology has advanced to where they are no longer just sharing photographs, playing games, and interacting on social media. They are now researching information, working, shopping and making purchases from their mobile devices.
In fact, one of the largest growing areas of content marketing is mobile content marketing. Due to the nature of a smartphone, this tactic requires special attention.
Know Your Audience
The first and most important consideration when adding mobile content to your content marketing strategy is to have a clear understanding of your audience.
- Are they searching with smartphones?
- If so, what are they searching for?
- Do they buy products and services?
- How much time do they spend online?
- When do they spend most of their time on their smartphone?
- What information do they access?
- Do they prefer visual content or do they read blog posts?
Types of Content
While it’s a good idea to experiment with various forms of content for mobile users, it’s also a good idea to understand what they are most likely to be interested in seeing.
For example, video is more often consumed via smartphone than a downloadable report and mobile users look at images more than they look at text.
Readers tend to get lost in long paragraphs. Cognitively, a viewer considers a paragraph to be a complete thought so if that thought is too long, then the reader will get impatient and move on. That isn’t to say that your content can’t go in depth into a subject, rather you may want to break it up into smaller pieces. Short form content is more likely to be consumed and is easier to read on a mobile device.
Formatting
You will need to take into consideration the fact that on a mobile device, your content will be more mobile friendly if it is well formatted. This means short paragraphs with subheadings and breaking up ideas into small pieces using bullets or numbers. Big fonts are easier to read, colors and visual elements need to add to the content, not distract from it.
Headlines Are Even More Important
Spend more time on creating your headlines. They have to be short and strong. Smartphone users have an even shorter attention span than those on their computer. You have to grab their attention immediately if you have any hope of them opening your content and spending time with it. Test and track various headlines to learn what your audience responds to.
The industry is changing and it’s changing fast—who can say where it’ll be in another four years? Now is the time for you to consider the mobile content opportunity. Should you decide to add it to your content marketing strategy, make sure to create specific goals for your mobile content. Also explore how you might integrate sharing features into your mobile content to keep your audience engaged and active with your brand.
Below are a few amazing statistics to consider.
78 percent of millennials use their smartphones more than two hours every day (Zogby)
Millennials and their smartphones are practically joined at the hip. I am the 80 percent; l reach for my smartphone every morning to shut off the alarm and more often than not find myself scrolling through my Twitter timeline. This demographic is only going to get more mobile—if you want to reach millennials, your mobile marketing has to be top notch.
51 percent of cell phone users 55 and older own smartphones (Nielsen)It’s not just millennials, though; as of 2014, more than half of cell phone owners over 55 years old use smartphones as well. (There’s even a Jitterbug smartphone.) That means you’re not limiting your marketing to a younger audience when you adopt a mobile-friend mindset.