Marketing to Moms: Four Things to Consider Before Developing an App

Considering an app to market to moms?  A recent study found that 97% of moms made a purchase on their tablet in the last month and they’re spending significantly more time on their tablets than laptops. There’s a huge opportunity for brands to provide value for moms on their tablets.

One way to make the most of moms on tablets is by developing an app for your brand. However, developing an app, especially for the first time, is not an easy task. It requires a big budget, skilled engineers, and dedicated marketers to build a useful, powerful app.

So before you begin, there are 4 key things to keep in mind when planning to develop a new app:

App functionality – In order to be truly effective, apps must be smart, innovative, and provide value to the customer. Know when your customers will be downloading the app and why they need it at that moment. Determine the use case scenario and keep it top of mind throughout all stages of development. Also know that you don’t have to include all potential features in the first release of the app. Prioritize the essential elements and add additional functionality in future releases.

Operating systems – You don’t need to develop an app for all platforms to be successful. Rather, understand the devices before choosing one or a few. First, narrow down your options by knowing which device your target audience uses. For example, about 51% of moms own an iPhone, iPad, or iPod, compared to 52% of teenagers owning an Android. Second, understand the pros and cons of the various platforms. Windows is known for its flexibility and provides a great user experience. Apple has fewer models and screen sizes so testing is easier. However, a rejection from Apple’s App Store means more time and money to make improvements. With Android, though, it’s easier to get apps into the Google Play store. On the down side, there are many Android models and testing on all of them is nearly impossible. Finally, testing on various devices requires lots of Quality Assurance (QA), not only for the first release but also to maintain the app as devices update their operating systems. Don’t forget to budget for ongoing QA as you develop your plan.

Pricing model – Will the app support your core business or will it be the sole revenue stream? If your business has other revenue sources, you may offer the app for free because it builds mobile presence and authority for your brand. If this will be your main revenue source, the app itself might be free but perhaps it will generate revenue through an eCommerce engine or paid membership. While some paid apps are very successful, tablet users have been shown to prefer free apps with ads to paid apps. Paid apps accounted for only 23% of all tablet app downloads in 2012. Does your app offer something that customers will pay for or does it offer another value to your business?

Download strategies – Marketing your app and getting customers to download it provides a huge challenge. Make sure your app is searchable within the app store. You can do this by choosing the most relevant keywords. What will customers be looking for when you want them to find your app? Find out and use those keywords. Note, you are limited a specific number of characters for keywords. For Apple, keywords must be less than 100 characters. Another download strategy is through email marketing. Email your existing customers and include a direct link to the app store so they can download the app immediately. Make it easy for them to find and download. Also consider integrating a social sharing element into your app so users market the app for you.

Creating an app may or may not be worth it for your business, but after thinking through each of these topics you should have a better idea of your approach and strategy. For more insights on the habits of moms on tablets and how to build the best app strategy for your brand, download the white paper, “Tablets 101: A Primer for Mom-Focused Brands.”

This guest post is by Katie Petrillo. She is the B2B Marketing Manager at Punchbowl, where she writes about marketing to moms for the Punchbowl Trends blog. Follow her on Twitter @PunchbowlTrends and find her on Google+.

Marketing to Women: Women Watching Super Bowl Too!

For those in advertising that are spending their Super Bowl money to reach only men, they are missing the wings and nachos boat.  The number of men versus women watching is getting more narrow.  Who is sitting next to the NFL commissioner at the game this year?  Why a little girl from Utah named Sam Gordon — a girl playing in an all-boys tackle football league.

Last year, 54 percent of the roughly 111 million viewers who tuned in to watch the Packers and Steelers on Fox were men, compared to 46 percent women.  And those women were not just delivering the pizza and chips to the guys in the family room.  They are real fans.

A recent survey by Advertising Age showed that 55 percent of American women watched at least one regular season NFL game last season, and women account for 20 percent of all fantasy football participants. In the last 10 years, the gender gap in the Super Bowl audience has narrowed from 14 percentage points in 2002 to 8 points in 2012. More women are watching the Super Bowl than the Academy Awards!

Since 2004, the NFL has been promoting more family-oriented half-time entertainment and fan attractions.  It’s no surprise that Beyonce is the half-time performer this year.  She appeals to both strong men and women, and she rocks that modern sensibility for young women. It is also not surprising that the first spot coming out of the half-time show was an All American Jeep and USO salute to our military, to our families and to our faith – voiced by Oprah.  As the mother of a deployed Marine, it definitely was my favorite.  My husband said, “Let’s go buy a Jeep.”

So what gives with many of the Super Bowl ads?  Many are sex-driven, testosterone celebrations.  Advertisers are being challenged to find a way to embrace female sexuality without degrading women.   “Especially given the female viewership, advertisers have to be broadly acceptable without being polarizing,” said Tim Calkins, marketing professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

The tasteless award this year may be model Kate Upton in a spot for Mercedes.  In the ad, the model is hand-washing a new Mercedes Benz C-Class in revealing attire for the entire 90 seconds of air-time.

But here’s the interesting dilemma:  More than half of all women polled in a PHD survey reported that Super Bowl advertisements using sex appeal equally targeted both genders. Seventy-four percent of women aged 18 to 34 said they liked the sexy images in the previous year’s Super Bowl advertisements, compared with 84 percent of men in the same age range.  So how do advertisers create the right mix of  female sexuality without the woman being portrayed in a demeaning fashion.

One of the ongoing issues for the advertising community is the lack of female creative directors.  Some estimate that only 3-4 percent of creative directors are female.  Why is that a problem?  Because creative departments start to take on the personality of a frat house.  Women are not fairly represented unless there are strong women in the account management and/or client side.

Marketing to Women: Get a Mobile Mindset for 2013

Nielsen has released a new report containing facts on how US consumers use different forms of media and devices. The information on  the top 8 activities performed on mobiles is fascinating, or at least I think so.

The top activity is texting, consuming 14.1% of our time.  Messaging (texting, email and instant messaging) compose 14.1% of our time, or one-fifth of our time on our mobile devices.  The lifeline for most of us is our texts and emails.

The second most consuming usage is social networks because we evidently all have FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), so we spend a whopping 10% of our time on social networks.  Actually dialing someone up and having a conversation only consumes about 5.5% of our time.   The other usage is consumed with browsing the internet, listening to music, using maps and our camera.  The mobile usage differs from our computer usage – which is geared to a variety of other activities.  One thing is the same – we spend a lot of time on social media.  Computer usage of social media is 20.1%, versus 10% of our mobile time.

And in terms of usage, 56% of mobile users have smartphones.  Eighty-five (85) million of us use social media apps on our smartphones, compared with 164 million have access to social media from their computers.

The bottom line is that each month, consumers are spending more time with more media, across all devices, and smart marketers need to understand the role of mobile in our daily lives.  We use mobile to stay connected, to manage our schedules, and the shop.  Some 78% of us use our smartphones to find a store, 63% check prices online and 22% comment on purchases.

Marketing to Women: Nielsen and Arbitron to Monopolize Ratings

Nielsen announced plans to buy Arbitron for $1.26 billion yesterday, extending the company’s monopoly reach on TV ratings in the U.S. to radio as well.  So what does that mean?  Well, unless regulatory review puts a halt to it,  it means that our media consumption lives will be measured across most media by Nielsen.

According to Media Post,  Nielsen will be the sole supplier of advertising trading currency for three major media: TV, online and radio. ”It makes Nielsen the currency for $85 billion in advertising — $68 billion for TV and $17 billion for radio,” Brad Adgate, senior vice president-director of research at Horizon Media, estimates of just the TV and radio portion of Nielsen’s market position.

Arbitron and Nielsen long have been in similar businesses – Nielsen in TV and Arbitron in radio ratings. The deal could allow the companies to share panels in a way that extends media measurement accuracy in TV and radio alike and open new opportunities for measuring streaming audio and out of home.  Radio is still alive and well, with US consumers listening almost two hours a day.

Nielsen CEO David Calhoun said that aside from growing their position in radio, the real value was the ability to link Arbitron’s radio audience estimates with Nielsen’s so-called “buy” data about consumer purchasing behavior, and even speculated that a new service would come from Arbitron’s integration with Nielsen Catalina.

It’s been 20 years since Arbitron shut down their television ratings service, making Nielsen the sole tracker.  Back then and even now, billions of dollars of advertising decisions are made on these ratings.  Nielsen has continued to grow their online  tracking service, Nielsen Online Campaign Ratings.

Marketing to Women: Instagram or Instagrim? New Policies Announced

I really love Instagram.  Apparently, others do as well.  There have been 5 billion photos shared through the network.  But there are new Instagram policies brewing giving marketers and personal users some things to think about.

The free photo-sharing social media program released an updated version of its privacy policy and terms of service today (December 17) and they include lots of long stipulations on how photographs uploaded by users may be used by Instagram and its parent company, Facebook.  Alert!  Alert!

Remember that Facebook bought Instagram for a measly $1 BILLION recently and then we all started having problems with our Instagram photos on Twitter because Instagram had disabled Twitter integration. These new policies seem to hint at adding advertising to Instagram.  

So now, what’s up with the policies that go in place on January 16, 2013?  Apparently they will not apply to photos shared before this date.  Instagram says that the new policies would primarily help the company combat spam, which has grown along with the popularity of Instagram.  The new policies will not alter how it handles photo ownership or who is able to see the pictures.

Here’s five important considerations that the New York Times reported today:

1. Instagram can share information about its users with Facebook, its parent company, as well as outside affiliates and advertisers.  They say it’s to make functionality and sharing easier between the two groups.    But certainly this information will inform targeted advertising for Instagram when and if that happens.  And allow Facebook advertisers access to Instagram information.  So, this is probably good for marketers.

2.  You could be featured in advertising without your knowledge, just like Facebook does now.  Instagram will also be able to use your photographs and identity in ads.  The “Rights” say “You agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata), and/or actions you take, in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you.”  So let’s say you upload a picture to Instagram of yourself and others who are not users of Instagram or Facebook.  Bam!  They may be in an ad along with you.  Maybe not so good for users or marketers if the images are not appropriate.

3.  The unsolicited use of photos applies to underage children as well.  Instagram requires that users must be at least 13 years of age, but the new policy states that they are agreeing that a parent or guardian is aware that their image, username and photos can also be used in ads.  This use of underage children is troubling.  Not so good for marketers.

4.  Ads may not be labeled as ads.  There may be no disclaimer that says you are viewing an ad.  “You acknowledge that we may not always identify paid services, sponsored content, or commercial communications as such,” says the new Instagram policy.  Maybe okay, but does not smack of transparency.

5.  Are you in – or are you out?  Deleting your account is the only way to opt out.   If you log into Instagram  through the Web site, mobile applications or any other services offered by Instagram, you  are agreeing to have your content used in ads. Instagram’s new terms of service say that “by accessing or using the Instagram website, the Instagram service, or any applications (including mobile applications) made available by Instagram (together, the “Service”), however accessed, you agree to be bound by these terms of use.”  Guess that’s what happens when your service is free.

Marketing to Women: Pinterest vs. Facebook Smackdown!

Have you ever created a book of inspirations?  For a wedding, wardrobe, home or entertaining?  Well, I have cabinets full of ideas that I tore out of magazines, pictures I took and products that I like.  Well, it seems that is what Pinterest is for women.  And what Facebook is not.In a Bizrate study among online shoppers using Pinterest, 70% said they do so to get inspiration on what to buy – that compares with just 17% of Facebook users who report the same.  So here’s the deal – Pinterest is about ideas and inspirations and Facebook is about relationships. That is why Pinterest users say they are more likely to use the site (43%) to engage with retailers and brands versus Facebook (24%).   Pinterest is definitely a discovery tool.  And Facebook is a relationship tool.  So it is no surprise that Pinterest users actually follow more brands than Facebook users do.

Engagement by Platform

Some interesting information has come out of this study that shows the differences in the user activity.  Facebook users are more passive  than Pinterest users.  I think this really gets at the purposes of the sites – Facebook is about connecting in a window shopping way (Participators and Observers) versus Pinterest (Creators) putting together ideas for a real shopping experience.  Marketing Charts summed it up this way:

For example, online shoppers who use Facebook are more than twice as likely as those who use Pinterest (55% vs. 26%) to say they’ve liked or followed a retailer or brand. They’re also more likely to have searched for a specific retailer or brand (30% vs. 23%), browsed photos or pinboards created by retailers or brands (44% vs. 36%), viewed or claimed coupons or sales (30% vs. 9%), and participated in contests or promotions (30% vs. 9%).

But while Facebook users appear more engaged in these observational activities, Pinterest users are more apt to be “creators,” as Bizrate Insights calls them. That means that Pinterest users are more likely to repin an item (55%) than Facebook users are to post or share one (37%). They’re also more likely to pin an item they saw on a retailer or brand’s website (37%) than are Facebook users to post or share such an item (27%).

Bottom Line

Facebook is still the gorilla.  Latest research from September 2012 shows that 63% of online consumers have a Facebook account, and only 15% of online consumers have a Pinterest account.  But as we know, things change quickly in social media.  Right now, marketers are not sure how to use Pinterest, while Facebook advertising has matured a bit.

Oh, and don’t forget, Pinterest recently surpassed Yahoo to become the fourth largest driver of traffic in the world.

What to do? Make sure you have a Pinterest page.  Have a Pinterest button on your website.  And start experimenting.  Remember that 10% of your budget should be used for new touch points – knowing that some will work and others won’t.

Marketing to Women: Women Love Football Too!

There is a prevalent myth among marketers that women don’t watch sports.  The NFL is debunking that myth.   Here’s some info from Advertising Age that shows that football scores with women.  The Super Bowl’s female audience has more than doubled in only five years.  The last three Super Bowl telecasts have set records for being the most-watched shows by female viewers.

And NBC’s “Sunday Night Football”  has  become the first sports show to finish in the top spot in prime time.  Why?  Well the weekly match-ups ranked fourth among women 18 to 49 years old, behind only “American Idol” (Wednesday), “The Voice” and “American Idol” (Thursday).

Another clue to the popularity should be the number of pink shoes and gloves you have seen on NFL players during Breast Cancer Awareness month.  The National Football League and NFL Players Association support October’s National Breast Cancer Awareness Month with their fourth-annual national breast cancer screening initiative and fundraising campaign. The campaign seems to be working - 64% of NFL female fans and 61% of all NFL fans identify the importance of annual screenings, especially for women over 40.

And football fashion is not far behind.  Remember those spots about NFL apparel for women?  Well, it turns out that it’s the NFL’s fastest growing consumer-products business, showing double-digit growth.  And who’s jersey reigns? Last year it was Pittsburgh Steelers safety Troy Polamalu  among women’s jersey sold. Polamalu was followed by Peyton Manning and Drew Brees, who rank fourth and second on the men’s list, respectively, according to stats from NFLShop.com.

The Dunham household has loved Troy Polamalu since he played for beloved USC Trojans.   Troy’s brother-in-lay and business partner Alex Holmes says that of Polamalu’s more than 2,222,349 likes on Facebook, 49 percent of his fans are female.

 

Marketing to Women: Just in Time Emails

Holiday marketing has begun. Does it matter when your email arrives in your target’s email box?  Well,  a new survey sheds light on how timing of an email reaching a recipient’s inbox affects engagement and purchase behavior.  Conducted in September 2012, the StrongMail Email Delivery Performance Survey 2012 included more than 700 business leaders participating in the global survey.  Some of the survey highlights include:

– 80% have seen performance increased for emails delivered during a particular time of day

– 61% cite a decrease in performance when emails don’t arrive at scheduled time

– 74% would like more control over the arrival of their campaigns

– 53% are not currently testing for an optimal delivery window for their email campaigns

– 61% are not currently doing any segmentation of email campaigns by time of day

When Consumers Prefer To Get Emails

Most consumers have a preferred time of day to shop online, but  research shows retailers are not aligning their email campaigns with those preferences, according to an October 2012 report from Yesmail. Here’s the kicker.  This report shows consumers (39%) preferring evenings between 6PM and 10PM as their preferred online shopping time, while just 5% of the email campaigns by top brands tracked over a 3-month period were delivered during that time window. The research suggests that the night time preference might be attributed to commuters shopping on mobile devices. Every target audience and geography has a preference of is own that should be determined by the marketer.   The majority (41%) of retail email campaigns are sent between 2AM-6AM, with another 31% from 6AM-10AM. These two time periods were preferred by just 5% of the consumers surveyed.

Marketers should consider timing their email campaigns based on subscribers’ channel preferences, as consumers who shop in-store indicate very different patterns than online shoppers. For example, 79% of in-store shoppers prefer to shop over the weekend, versus 31% of online shoppers. Among those online shoppers, 47% who identified a day-of-week preference selected a day between Monday and Wednesday.

What Consumers Want in Promotional Offers

What type of promotions get our consumers’ attention?  Consumers say the promotions that most influence them are percent discount, free shipping, money off, buy-one-get-one-free, gift with purchase and rewards points. When actual email promotions were tracked for a 3-month period, they measured up to consumer desires.  Discounts were the majority share (54%) of email promotions, followed by free shipping (30%), money off (13%), rewards points (2%), and a gift with purchase (1%).

For those of you who have not sent your first holiday season email, here’s some news that might give you pause.  Fifteen percent of top online retailers sent their first holiday email campaign in September this year.  That 15% is up from 11% only two years ago.  Everyone is vying for holiday dollars this year.

 Shopping Begins in October.  

Most consumers (51 percent) start their holiday shopping in October or November.  Twenty percent start their shopping before October, though 24 percent wait until December.

Marketing to Women: Time to Market with Pinterest?

Still afraid to jump into Pinterest marketing?  Valerie Kuznik, a Lipstick Economy Contributor, has found three big take-aways from a great infographic from Maxymiser on Pinterest marketing.  

1. Who is on Pinterest? Your dream consumer! These users are “an active group of people who are willing to tell the world about the things they want, identify with and recommend.” Log on and meet your “online world-of-mouth marketing team” ready and waiting to shout your brand from the rooftops.
2. What about Facebook? In terms of generating referral traffic, Pinterest trumps Twitter but still falls short of Facebook. That being said, it still drives more traffic than the combined efforts of YouTube, LinkedIn, and Google +. Impressive!
3. How can I use Pinterest for my brand? Make sure that the boards you create “help to tell your story.” Who is your brand? What is its personality? What inspires the brains behind your brand? Other must-dos include adding the Pinterest icon to your website, allowing others to repin your content, and pairing every piece of content to which you want to draw traffic with a killer, eye-catching photo. If this means hiring a photographer or graphic designer, it’s worth it! Grab a Pinner’s attention and be prepared to reap the rewards.

Marketing to Women: Five Lessons Learned from Olympics

This was the Year of the Woman at the 2012 Olympics, and there were marketing lessons to be learned by all of us.  But just to pause and enjoy the moment.  Consider this:  Women won 2/3 of America’s medals in the 2012 Olympics. If US women were their own country, they’d have placed fifth in the medal count standings. Most attribute this fact to Title IX.  Since President Richard Nixon signed Title IX into law in 1972, American educational institutions have been required to fund women’s sports in a way that’s proportional to the male/female breakdown of the school.

Importance of women as an Olympic audience.  Traditionally, the Olympics is the only major sports event that attracts audiences that are majority-female. The Gallup Daily tracking survey done by phone with 1,082 U.S. adults and taken Aug. 4-5 during the Olympics reported that  43% of women say they were watching a lot, while just 36% of men say so and only 30% of unmarried men.

Why is that true of the Olympics and not other sporting events?  Maybe we need a Title IX for households.  In a new study published in Communication, Culture & Critique, they found that “Women’s TV sports consumption habits were more mediated by their personal schedules than by team schedules or TV schedules.”  It seems that women’s role in the household trumps watching sports.  And when they do watch, they like the easy to follow narratives that Olympics coverage is famous for.  And while Title IX has increased the number of female athletes, it still hasn’t changed the audience for female sports.  That’s why women’s basketball has never reached the same level of success as men’s basketball.

Marketing to Moms Still Reigns.  Most of us know that P&G has taken their Proud Sponsor of Moms to new Gold status.  Procter & Gamble is looking to generate $500 million in sales from its massive marketing push centered on Olympic athletes and their moms.Global Brand Building Officer Marc Pritchard said it was an attempt to build a “perfect storm” of TV, digital, social and PR activity around closely followed events. It spans 34 brands and 150 sponsored athletes, with the “Thank you, Mom” concept that was first executed during the 2010 Vancouver Olympics serving as “the glue that ties it together to do multi-brand activations within retailers,” he said.  Moms were actually the glue.  The spots were so likable that you couldn’t get tired of them.

The mobile Olympics.  The times have changed dramatically in just four years.  Social media and events have a symbiotic relationship.  A blast back to 2008 – the iPhone was new, the app store had just launched, and the BlackBerry was the most popular smartphone.  And there was no iPad.  So in this Olympics, social media was propelled by mobile.  NBC, the athletes, the sponsors and the fans were all sharing on social media.   About 50% of streams from NBC came from mobile devices.  Data released in August by Twitter indicates that there were more than 150 million tweets about the Olympics during the course of the Games.   There’s a great infographic on Mashable that portrays the impact of social media in this year’s Olympics.  Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt was the big winner, with more than 960,000 mentions during the Games. American swimmer Michael Phelps took social silver with over 830,000 mentions.  Gabby Douglas went from 20,000 followers to 686,077 followers on Twitter.

Immediacy of today demands “real time ads”.    Marketers no longer have the luxury of planning a campaign and allowing it to run unchanged.   Today, marketers have to be in the moment to capitalize on events and sponsorships.  And yes, it can be exhausting but it is important.  Did you see the Visa or AT&T ads?   Commercials incorporated footage from events that had occurred just hours earlier, including the American women’s victory in gymnastics and Sanya Richards-Ross’ win in the 400-meter dash. The trend in the London Games toward “real time” advertising were marked by quickly produced commercials that enable advertisers to leverage the Olympics’ most buzzworthy moments.  The advertisers enjoyed special relationships with NBC that allowed them footage to these magic moments.  Brands were able to leverage their ties to the Olympics and increase their positive public perception at the same time.

Understanding your target and the use of ambush marketing.  Nike did a brilliant job in creating juggernaut exposure for the new Volt.  How could you not see those ubiquitous neon-yellow Volt shoes.  It seems that Nike passed on the official sponsorship and went straight to the athletes. Because we all want to be like Mike.  Their original brand strategy has never strayed from that original Michael Jordan advertising.  According to Nike, 41 athletes won medals wearing the shoes as of Friday, including 43% of track and field medalists.  Most people will tell you that they think Nike was the official shoe.  Seems rival Adidas reportedly paid $155 million to be an official London 2012 sponsor.  And if the shoes weren’t enough, didn’t you just love the spot with the 12 year old from London, Ohio, who slowly jogs toward the camera as the voiceover tells us that greatness “is not some precious thing … we’re all capable of it. All of us.”

The Olympics have been remarkable for all of us.  It brings America together, it makes new stars, it showcases our grit and pride, and it teaches how best to market.  I can’t wait for the Winter Olympics.