Mobile Marketing Crowd Says Improvements Must Be Made For Growth To Happen: Report

A survey conducted at the Mobile Marketing Association's Mobile Marketing Forum this week in New York quizzed advertising agencies, content providers, aggregators, carriers and others about the space to understand from an insider's view of what is going on in the industry. The survey was completed by 129 attendees and conducted by Bellevue-based Motricity. Based on the results, Steve Leonard, Motricity's GM off-deck, compared the state of the industry to the early days of the Internet. "The investment in mobile marketing and advertising may be low today, but the results of our survey make it clear that there is tremendous potential for growth in this category." Release.

Here's a rundown of the results:

-- 40 percent of marketing agencies said they currently spend less than 2 percent on mobile marketing initiatives, however, one-third of the group said they expected to increase spending by more than 25 percent next year.

-- 71 percent of the content providers and 58 percent of technology providers polled said that advertisers aren't using mobile marketing and advertising because the channel is underdeveloped.

-- 31 percent of wireless operators reported that they are looking for more information from the mobile ecosystem on the strategies used for executing mobile marketing campaigns.

-- 49 percent of content providers and 36 percent of aggregators said that "targeting and demographics" are most critical to effective mobile marketing campaigns.

-- 23 percent of wireless operators said they felt that content customization and personalization are the key to increasing mobile marketing.

-- 48 percent of agencies said opt-ins or registrations are most important for demonstrating return-on-investment.