Mobile-First Strategies Take Hold in Emerging Markets
Emerging markets can also demonstrate a lack of alignment between consumer intent and advertising execution, Ganeshandan says. Audience reach is growing in Southeast Asia, he points out, but click-through rates remain extremely low. "Businesses need to gain better understanding of consumer interests in emerging markets in order to improve engagement with mobile marketing content," he says.
But that can be easier said than done. "To deliver the right message, you have to be able to track what the user is doing; that's difficult to do with mobile apps in emerging countries because only 60 percent of them include any tracking capabilities," says Karen Wood, director of product marketing for Encytin.
Start with a marketing strategy for awareness, content, and conversion, says Eric Holmen, senior vice president of global sales for Invoca. "Once you have those three things figured out, you can be really bullish, because the marketing costs are low. The buyer is looking for an easy way to engage on mobile."
WORK WITH ECONOMIC DISPARITIES
The cost structures for entering and advertising in each market differ, Druxerman cautions. So marketers and their clients need to understand the potential returns in different markets and closely monitor whether actual results keep pace with initial projections. If results lag, determine what strategy shifts the company needs to make in its marketing plan.
"The mobile market is so new in many of these places that, in order to be a mobile leader, you need to quickly figure out what works and what doesn't by doing some intensive testing and experimentation," Druxerman says.
While fulfillment, payment, and delivery are relatively mature in the U.S., far more problems exist with bottom-of-the-funnel issues in emerging markets, cautions Moshe Kranc, chief technology officer of Ness Technologies. Companies need to understand and work with local delivery systems, payment methods, etc., to ensure promises aren't made through mobile advertising that can't be met on the back end.
Though smartphones and carrier plans have become more affordable, they're pricey by emerging-economy standards, Holmen adds. While the middle class is emerging in many of these markets, affluent people are few, and a large percentage are still eking out an existence. So he recommends that marketers work with wireless plan providers on advertising subsidized plans and, where 3G and 4G are available, using pre-roll video that plays for a few seconds before the user can opt out—similar to YouTube and other digital video ads in the U.S. It's essential that any such video has strong product identification and call to action before the user can opt out.
ADVICE FOR SUCCESS
Marketers offer several overarching tips for entering and succeeding in emerging markets. Forrester's Ask recommends that companies entering emerging markets follow the leads of brands that have been successful with "manufacturing mobile moments," creating new reasons for consumers to engage, such as apps targeted to pregnant women or entertainment-based apps. Other brands are "borrowing mobile moments" by tapping into the audience breadth on platforms such as WeChat, BBM, KakaoTalk, Line, WhatsApp, and Facebook, to build an initial mobile audience because it's so difficult to start from scratch.
"Borrowed mobile moments are most essential to winning Chinese customers," says Xiaofeng Wang, a senior analyst at Forrester. WeChat, with 500 million active users, and a few other mega-apps with a wide range of features dominate consumers' mobile activity. Half of consumers' mobile minutes are spent on WeChat alone. So consumers are less likely to download and use individual brand apps, which consume valuable memory and provide less total capability than the mega-apps. Taxi-hailing apps are also popular and offer compelling cross-promotional opportunities.
Work with national and local partners, several experts suggest. Native marketing and business experts understand the language and cultural differences. "Nobody knows a market like a member of that market," Timmerman says. "A marketing campaign for India won't necessarily work well in Eritrea, Addis Ababa, or Dar es Salaam. There's no magic here. You still have to know your market, you still have to individualize your messaging, and you still have to respond at the speed of your customer. The real key is to get some local insight and to use a partner that has experience in the region."
However, experts caution that local app developers are in high demand and low supply, so they command high compensation. As developers are trying to create and manage assets for the myriad of devices, operating systems, form factors, and connection speeds, mobile development apps that can deliver digital asset management and content management capabilities are crucial, says Fonseca.
"Be as exact as you can when targeting emerging markets," Gupta adds. "For example, if you go into Latin America, you are likely not going to start off with all of Latin America." Typically, a company will move into one Latin American country, then expand to others. Concentrate on the culture, language, available technology, and other unique attributes of the initial country (for example, Costa Rica) rather than strategizing for the region (Latin America) as a whole, even if that is in the company's long-term plans.
The emerging markets still have many challenges, as noted above. But following these tried-and-true mobile-first strategies can help marketers find more opportunities—and increase their chance of success—in these growing economies.
Phil Britt is a freelance writer who focuses on high-tech, financial services, and other industries. He can be reached at spenterprises@wowway.com.