Mobile Marketers Want Self-regulation, Define Marketing Strategies
Mobile advertising doesn’t need government regulation, speakers said during a webinar sponsored by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Wednesday. A new IAB report, a Mobile Buyer’s Guide, was released with the session. Advertisers see privacy as a fundamental consideration in mobile advertising, said Cameron Clayton, vice president of Mobile Weather Channel Interactive. The industry regulates itself with guidelines and rules on consumer education, disclosures about what information is collected and special protections for sensitive data, he said. “Government regulations will only be problematic,” he said, saying industry groups are working on more-developed privacy guidelines and rules.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
Mobile carriers play a significant role, because every campaign that runs on a network needs the carrier’s approval, said Gary Schwartz, CEO of marketing firm Impact Mobile. So understanding carriers’ privacy policies is a must for advertisers, said Patricia Clark, vice president of sales at 4INFO, a messaging service provider. Mobile advertisers should also work with their clients to ensure compliance, she said. The IAB, with three other advertising trade associations, recently proposed self-regulatory principles in an effort to head off legislation. But consumer and privacy groups, including the Electronic Privacy Information Center, questioned the effectiveness of self-regulation.
In general, buyers with limited time and money should concentrate first on mobile Web-display campaigns, the IAB report said. As budgets increase, they can expand into messaging, traditional media integration and out-of-home mobile campaigns, it said. Landing pages are a crucial part of mobile display campaigns and so is a text-messaging campaign, particularly location-based SMS promotion, said Joe Laszlo, the IAB research director. Meanwhile, a growing trend is to integrate a mobile campaign, particularly messaging, with a traditional campaign, Schwartz said. Common short codes and 2-D barcodes are ways to increase traffic without increasing capital spending, the report said.
Speakers said measurement engagement is critical. But measurement across online and mobile isn’t seamless. The IAB is working with the Mobile Marketing Association to extend online advertising measurement standards to mobile -- recognizing the many similarities but also the unique challenges and advantages of mobile inventory, the report said.