One can argue that mobile marketing has now become the primary channel for all forms of marketing. With over 7.2 billion smartphones around the world, mobile usage is at its peak.
Throw in social media in the mix and you get one of the most ripe opportunities for marketing and advertising today.
To give you a better idea, I went through a lot of data, case studies, and subject matter experts to bring the latest mobile marketing trends to you.
Let’s get started.
Mobile Marketing Trends to Watch in 2024
The average American today spends 4 hours and 37 minutes on their phones. So, realistically speaking, mobile marketing is the best opportunity to get your word out today and businesses are realizing that.
Mobile marketing budget shares are the highest they’ve ever been this year.
It’s not rocket science that mobile marketing budgets have been increasing according to the improvements in smartphones and handheld devices.
However, one can argue that for the last ten years, we’ve been at a point where smartphones have been a major part of most people’s lives.
Despite that, companies didn’t dedicate much of their marketing budget toward mobile marketing.
In fact, Statista’s data shows that up until 2018, mobile marketing budgets accounted for less than 10% of all marketing budgets.
The boost to 23% you see in 2020 is simply because of the pandemic. Companies no longer had to spend budgets on large-scale print ads, billboards, display signage, and large screens.
So they shifted their existing budgets to mobile because that was among the only ways to reach customers.
Therefore, after the pandemic, mobile marketing budgets were slashed again.
However, in 2024, we’re seeing more companies than ever dedicating a significant amount of their marketing budgets to mobile, despite any macro factors.
This signifies a drastic shift toward a mobile-first approach. I say that because a good majority of marketing budgets go toward content marketing, paid ads, and social media today. These are channels that can be directly tied to mobile marketing.
At any rate, companies that are investing less actively in their mobile marketing strategies today are bound to lag behind.
Mobile conversion rates on e-commerce sites remain lower than desktop conversion rates.
I’ve personally been checking out mobile vs desktop conversion rates on e-commerce sites and desktop has always been winning.
Even if I myself want to order something online, I prefer doing so on my desktop/laptop, especially with bigger purchases or subscriptions.
There’s something about desktops or bigger screens that makes you feel like it’s easier to understand and read the fine print.
And, I know that a lot of other people feel the same way which is why desktop conversion rates remain higher.
In fact, if you track buyer journeys, you’ll find that many people discover a product or even research it on mobile. However, when it comes to purchasing, they do that on their desktops and laptops.
Another study by Dynamic Yield found that 67% of consumers believe that pages and links are too small while mobile shopping and this leads them to shift to desktops for buying things.
So, what can you do as an e-commerce brand?
I would recommend an in-depth analysis of your buyers’ journeys. I’ve found HockeyStack to be a great tool for this. You can find out exactly where a buyer shifted from mobile to desktop.
You can also find out how many people started their journey from mobile.
This will help you understand how important mobile marketing is to your broader marketing strategy.
Because let’s say that over 50% of your buyers’ journeys start on mobile, it means you should be investing more there, despite lower conversion rates.
There will be a greater emphasis on privacy in mobile marketing.
Over the last few years, there has been a shift from companies, organizations, and users to focus more on privacy. In most cases, Apple and Google have been leading the charge here.
Recently, Google announced its Privacy Sandbox – its attempt to remove third-party cookies on Android and Chrome.
However, despite a plan that stretched several years, Google recently announced a shift in its plans. Instead of eliminating 3P cookies in Chrome, they now plan to allow users to make individual informed choices to adjust their browsing experience.
That’s a fancy way of saying, “We’re changing nothing except adding a few more options to choose cookie preferences making it a bit more complicated.” This very well may make it less likely that users actually do something about it.
This decision likely stems from Google’s own testing of the repercussions of removing 3P cookies as a whole and their Privacy Sandbox.
They found that removing 3P cookies would reduce revenue for advertisers using Ad Manager by 34% and 21% for those using AdSense.
Meanwhile, with Privacy Sandbox APIs, advertising using Ad Manager would lose 20% of their revenue and those using AdSense would lose 18%.
While that is not ideal, it is where the world is moving toward with more demand for privacy across the board.
At any rate, with the addition of Apple’s app tracking transparency and new regulations and updates with GDPR and CCPA, mobile marketing will need to adhere to certain rules.
A greater focus on the use of first-party data is inevitable.
The proliferation of mobile commerce means mobile-only marketing for many brands.
Meanwhile, desktops accounted for 23% of all traffic on e-commerce sites and tablets accounted for 2%.
Furthermore, 64% of all orders on e-commerce websites in the US came from smartphones. 34% of orders came from desktops and 2% came from tablets.
It’s true that some people like to browse on their mobile phones but make the actual purchase on their computer, especially when it comes to large or expensive purchases.
However, despite that, every 6 out of 10 online orders in the US today are made from smartphones and that will only increase going forward.
This shift towards mobile commerce also means a shift in how brands market to consumers. Mobile-first marketing isn’t new but a lot of brands are still lagging behind in this case. The most common mistake is to not have a mobile-optimized website.
However, when we look at newer websites, you’ll see they’re designed to be mobile-first. Especially when you use tools like Wix or WordPress, it’s easy to create a website that’s optimized for all platforms.
But a lot of brands have started to only focus on mobile, including their marketing efforts. Considering how much time people spend on their phones versus other devices, it makes sense.
Of course, this is true for certain audiences like Gen Z and Millennials. So, brands that target such audiences are and will adopt a mobile-only marketing strategy.
This doesn’t only mean mobile optimization but means they may only opt for paid ads on mobile. Or they may commit to mobile-first SEO, like making sure loading times on mobile are low while not focusing on desktop loading times.
Regardless, a mobile-only marketing strategy isn’t a bad idea in 2024; in fact, it may be what you need.
The growing adoption of 5G services is prompting unique marketing strategies like the use of augmented reality.
The 5G services market is currently growing at a CAGR of 44.63%. Based on that growth rate, the market will be worth $1.87 trillion by 2030.
As demand for a fully mobile environment increases, so does the demand for higher bandwidth, internet speeds, and availability.
The accessibility of 5G-level speeds and bandwidth means that brands can now tap into several marketing gimmicks that they previously couldn’t.
For example, this makes augmented reality and virtual reality more plausible to use. Yes, they both have been used for quite a while but have often lacked success due to slow internet speeds and limited bandwidth.
It’s also why brands never invested in graphics-intensive experiences.
However, with 5G, these experiences will seem seamless with little to no loading times at all.
The same goes for other forms of experiences that require higher bandwidth and internet speeds. For example, higher-quality video experiences.
Most platforms limit higher-resolution videos, especially social apps. However, YouTube easily supports 4K and 8K videos.
Instead of downgrading videos and pictures, brands can develop and upload higher-quality versions and distribute them.
The same can be applied to gamification tactics. Instead of creating simple retro-style games, applications, and UIs, brands can create better-quality and graphically intensive experiences.
However, I believe the biggest change will be in the form of real-time marketing through hyper-personalization, along with the use of IoT for marketing.
This will allow brands (within privacy limits) to offer relevant marketing materials based on real-time data acquired from a user’s surroundings without having to individually create personalization profiles.
When you throw generative AI in the mix, it may be possible to create marketing materials in real time. Although, we might have a few years before that becomes a reality.
Mobile App Marketing Trends
Mobile apps include all forms of applications from social apps to gaming apps. They make up a good majority of mobile marketing spend, especially if you factor in social marketing.
Here’s what you need to know about mobile app marketing today.
The YouTube app still has the highest mobile audience reach.
The fact that YouTube has a higher mobile audience reach than Gmail, one of the largest email apps, shows YouTube’s potential in marketing strategies.
Not nearly enough companies utilize YouTube to its full potential in their marketing strategies. And, I’m not only talking about YouTube ads here but also about building a brand on YouTube.
Take MrBeast for example, he has built his entire brand on YouTube and has now become the first person to cross 300 million subscribers on YouTube. That’s almost as much as the entire population of the United States.
My point is, that not enough companies are investing in making videos on YouTube to build a brand there. It doesn’t necessarily need to be about the company itself. It can be an extension of it.
A good example of this is Chewy’s YouTube channel. While their channels have the typical product tutorials, advice, and commercials, they went the extra mile and introduced the ‘A Day in the Life’ series.
This series takes viewers on a journey into the lives of different people around animals. It can be a dog trainer, a veteran and his service dog, or an equine therapy farm.
Regardless, it’s good entertaining and informational content beyond the product and company itself that helps build Chewy’s brand as an extension.
At any rate, the thing is that mobile app marketing has massive potential, even if you remove the social media apps.
Uploading custom tunes on Spotify, adding interesting eye-catching cues on Apple Maps, and making your Google Play Store app outlook interesting; there are many ways to invest in mobile marketing and reach your audience.
People spend up to 5.5X more time on mobile apps compared to browsers.
In comparison, people only spend around 14.7 hours on browsers on their mobile devices each month.
This is despite having almost the same number of unique monthly visitors.
Therefore, companies that only take a look at unique monthly visitors as a metric tend to fall behind. Under that assumption, mobile marketing budgets should go to browser-based and app-based marketing equally.
And, it’s not uncommon for companies and C-level executives to do this.
However, a deeper dive reveals that people spend 5.5 times more time on mobile apps than browsers. This makes mobile apps a much bigger opportunity for mobile marketing.
That being said, this doesn’t mean browsers aren’t a big market either. To understand how much of a role browsers will play in your mobile marketing strategy, you need to check out the buyers’ journeys to see how many buyers started off from browsers.
Another thing to keep in mind is that a lot of time spent on apps can be explained by social media, news, entertainment, and email apps.
That, of course, means your marketing strategy needs to be adjusted according to how your audience uses their apps and in what capacity.
That means using various forms of mobile marketing at times when your audience is using their phones and apps.
If someone gets an SMS or notification while they’re using their phone, it’s more likely to be seen or acknowledged. However, it’s important not to overdo it either.
43% of users who receive between 2-5 weekly push notifications disable notifications. 30% stop using an app if they receive 6-10 weekly push notifications.
Mobile gaming ads will continue to dominate in-app advertising.
The fact that consumers spend almost 2.5 times more while gaming on mobile shows the potential of mobile ads.
Mobile gaming is currently accounting for 56% of the market share of all consumer spend in the gaming world.
Now, in-game consumer spending is largely driven by in-game ads. From pop-ups to full-blown video ads integrated into the games.
This may vary from game to game though; for example, in games like Call of Duty Mobile, PUBG, and Genshin Impact, a lot of new content is locked behind tertiary in-game currencies that can be bought with real currency.
This method of using proxy currencies not only works but leads to greater demand among consumers.
The games often market these content packs by collaborating with content creators on YouTube, Twitch, and social platforms.
Another form of in-game advertisement includes rewarded video ads. This is when players can watch a video ad to get some form of in-game currency or reward.
While this is a great way to show ads, more often than not, they do not hit the mark. That is why most of the video ads today are of other games so people download their games.
I personally have played a few mobile games and have watched these reward ads; I would say almost 80% of the ads I got were of other games. That said, the other 20% ads of other apps worked on me on occasion.
My point is, that these ads work, especially if your purpose is to get people to download your app or game. The key is, of course, proper targeting which can be complicated.
With increased consumer spend on social apps, social media marketing on mobile remains a priority with TikTok leading the charge.
The current year-on-year growth of consumer spend is 13%. This has prompted many social apps to make use of various monetization strategies beyond advertising.
Another important thing to note is that the total hours on social apps reached 2.33 trillion across the world.
As for TikTok, it became the first social app to reach $10 billion in all-time consumer spend in 2023. Currently, TikTok has surpassed $1 billion in consumer spend per quarter, a first for any non-gaming app.
This is attributed to secondary monetization on mobile; for example, TikTok has coins that can be used to tip creators during live streams which can be bought with real currency.
It’s not a new method, it was used by Reddit, Steam, and several other platforms.
At any rate, it has not only helped TikTok improve consumer spend but also the total time spent on the app. With increased time spent, more users, and high returns, many brands have shifted focus from other social apps.
This has also brought about a shift in how marketing budgets are used today. For example, today, 22.4% of companies are spending 10-20% of their marketing budget on influencer marketing.
Meanwhile, 26% are investing more than 40% of their marketing budget on influencer marketing.
This can be largely attributed to TikTok and its investment in its content creators and influencers. However, TikTok’s share of global digital advertising revenue is only 2.7%.
So, the focus of marketers and brands with TikTok isn’t paid ads, but other forms of marketing with UGC being the priority.
Retail media is undergoing a major boom, with a massive increase in retail media ad spend.
Retail media spend is a large part of e-commerce app marketing. Between 2024 to 2028, total retail media spend is expected to undergo a major boom.
By 2028, total retail media spend is expected to double. Furthermore, 73% of advertisers are planning to increase their retail media network budget next year.
Between all forms of digital ads, retail media accounts for $1 out of every $6 spent on digital ads.
The reason retail media spending is getting this kind of growth in mobile marketing is due to the use of first-party data, on account of recent privacy regulations.
Meanwhile, publishers are also seeing it as a source of major revenue.
Therefore, you have original first-party data to allow for segmented audiences, better ad optimization, and accurate measurements of success.
With more people than ever using mobile phones for e-commerce, retail media ad spend is not an option but a necessity now.
However, you need to keep in mind that the retail media market is relatively competitive. But that’s only more reason to act first.
Mobile Video Marketing Trends
Mobile video has become an essential tool for most marketers. Currently, 68% of marketers create between 0 and 10 videos each month while 26% of marketers create between 11 and 20 videos.
User-generated content remains a priority in 2024.
UGC isn’t a new trend, it has been important and a priority for a few years now. Every year, someone claims that UGC will become obsolete or will evolve into something else. Every year, it doesn’t happen.
Why? User-generated content ticks all the boxes for the majority – it is perceived as trustworthy, genuine, and direct.
Authenticity is the modern-day marketer’s sharpest weapon.
People have been exposed to traditional marketing for over a century now. And, add the fact that consumers today have access to, quite literally, an inexhaustible amount of content.
Standing out has always been vital but it’s most important today. Because standing out today doesn’t mean getting a following, it just means doing something to get recognized at the very least.
Other than that, marketers and companies like UGC for another very important reason – it’s extremely cost-effective.
You don’t have to pay an agency thousands of dollars, or a broadcast station millions of dollars, or online advertisers to get your message out. You simply reach out to your customer base, passively of course.
While UGC includes many content forms like blog posts and social media posts, the emphasis is always on videos. Short-form videos to be exact; the kind that’s shared to platforms like TikTok and Instagram.
The trick with UGC is to differentiate it from influencer marketing. Let’s be honest, the majority of UGC is the result of a brand hiring content creators rather than being organic. It just needs to look the part.
While influencers have reach, user-generated content from smaller content creators with loyal followings can generate unprecedented word of mouth — authenticity at its best.
There is a rise in Connected TV campaigns.
CTV campaigns refer to advertising delivered through internet-connected television; in other words, the ads you see while streaming.
It’s a shift in mobile marketing toward more immersive marketing. As more people are opting for streaming services, it’s opening a huge opportunity for advertisers.
Currently, mobile devices account for 8.7% of total streaming viewing time and that is bound to increase as we move forward.
Another study found that almost 70% of other digital video content was viewed on smartphones. That includes all other non-streaming video content like YouTube videos, TikToks, etc.
Other than that, the current CTV ad household reach is at 99%. That means if you run a CTV campaign, you are guaranteed views.
Furthermore, in the US alone, 110 million CTV users include Gen Z and Millennials.
A good majority of these users prefer CTV campaigns over other forms of ads. Such ads are shown on Smart TVs, gaming consoles, and devices like Apple TV, Amazon Fire Stick, and Roku.
Furthermore, CTV ads use programmatic advertising technology. It automates the placement, buying, and optimization of ads. Therefore, it’s relatively more efficient for marketers, advertisers, and organizations.
Since CTV ads are internet-based, advertisers can also make use of metrics like app usage and viewing habits for better targeting.
The only issue with CTV ads is measuring their performance. When you factor in new privacy compliance, it makes it difficult to calculate the effectiveness of a campaign.
At any rate, at the very least, it’s a great way to get impressions and get the word out.
Mobile video marketing campaigns will get more attention and budget.
For a lot of brands, old and new, video is not the primary frontier. Considering the success of marketing on TikTok and Instagram, along with how popular YouTube is, most brands understand that video marketing is a priority now.
What brands need to think about is what kind of video they focus on. Viral customer testimonials, interesting product demos, and educational content are only some of the options.
Regardless, right now is the perfect time to convey brand missions, values, and stories. Building a strong brand identity through video is the best way to reach today’s audiences and the audience of tomorrow.
That being said, the success of mobile video marketing in general is understood. However, the reason some companies may feel like video isn’t doing much for them is because of how they measure video success.
According to Vidico’s research, 74% of companies measure video success through engagement metrics. That includes views, overall view rate, and the average watch time.
Meanwhile, only 48% look at conversion rates and total lead generation.
Upper-level management is likely to look at the conversion rates and prioritize them because they show a direct return on investment.
Meanwhile, marketers focus on engagement metrics because they show how well they’re able to retain an audience’s attention, potentially opening up more opportunities to market to them.
To accurately assess video success on mobile, use diverse metrics. A combination of engagement metrics, lead gen numbers, traffic value/type, and brand perception studies.
Use proper attribution software to track buyer journeys through video campaigns and figure out which metrics are most associated with growth and success for you.
Mobile Marketing Statistics
Mobile ad advertising in the US has more than doubled in 2024 compared to 2020. Currently, total spend is expected to be $216 billion by the end of 2024.
Mobile marketing may soon become the primary channel for most marketing and advertising.
53% of all website traffic today comes from mobile devices.
Despite that more than half of all website traffic comes from mobile devices, companies are not investing enough in mobile marketing strategies.
As mentioned in trend 1, while mobile marketing budgets are their highest, it’s still not enough to account for the magnitude of mobile traffic.
What’s interesting is that mobile traffic started to account for half of all traffic back in 2017. However, companies didn’t adjust their marketing budgets accordingly up until last year.
That being said, it’s not fair to generalize all companies to this standard. Statistics show direct data but don’t account for other factors.
What I’m talking about is how a lot of companies shifted their focus toward social media marketing and paid ads thinking it includes mobile. Well, it does in a sense.
When you invest in social and ads, the investment reverberates across all devices and outlets, including mobile. So, in a lot of cases, marketing managers and CMOs count it as mobile marketing.
Every company has a slightly different approach and understanding of what comes under mobile marketing.
What’s the solution? I might sound like a broken record but omnichannel marketing, or some hybrid of omnichannel and multichannel marketing.
A holistic marketing strategy where each channel compliments other marketing channels.
However, to do that, every person in the marketing department needs to be involved in budget allocation meetings.
It will help to not only create more robust and well-rounded marketing strategies but will also ensure the proper distribution of marketing budgets.
Over time, it will allow companies to efficiently target mobile audiences.
The global consumer spend on mobile apps will be $2.2 trillion between 2021 and 2030.
Compared to the last decade, that’s a 267% increase in global consumer spending across all apps.
The report also found that global app downloads this decade would reach 2.9 trillion, compared to 1.3 trillion last decade; that’s a 123% increase.
As for the total hours spent on mobile apps, the report found that users with Android phones alone would spend 58 trillion hours on mobile apps this decade. That calculates to almost 16 billion hours every single day.
This data includes both gaming and non-gaming mobile apps.
According to Statista, the current revenue in the app market is approximately $522 billion. The market is growing at a CAGR of 8.83% and will reach $673 billion by 2027.
In-app purchases alone are worth around $172.5 billion while revenue from people actually buying apps is $6.09 billion.
This is why there’s a massive trend of freemium apps, especially in gaming mobile apps. The idea is to bring people in and then offer shortcuts for a premium.
Furthermore, total app downloads across all mobile platforms are expected to reach 288 billion by the end of 2024. What I find interesting is that out of that number, approximately 150 billion downloads are of games, that’s about 52%.
Despite the massive success of games in general, not many brands take advantage of it. There have been notable examples though with the most famous being Pepsi Man.
Another interesting recent example I found was from a campaign for British Gas. Their marketing agency created a retro-style game called Meter Maze where the objective is to save electricity.
After every round, you have the option to watch other content from British Gas where they teach users about their products, such as smart meters.
Expert Insights on Mobile Marketing Trends
Almost all forms of marketing today can be tied to a mobile marketing strategy. And every marketer today agrees that mobile marketing is the priority today.
However, that starts with the right tools. Alessandro L., a digital marketing expert says that it’s crucial to be ahead of emerging tech like AR-incorporated marketing campaigns.
He also emphasizes the importance of using proper mobile messaging tools. For example, a boutique clothing store may use WhatsApp Business to update customers about new arrivals and offers.
Moving on, Kalin Kassabov, founder and CEO of ProTexting(.com), says that to take advantage of mobile marketing, you need mobile-friendly websites, SMS marketing, app marketing, and mobile ads.
While SMS marketing may be a hit or miss with many marketers, the rest is essential for success today.
Furthermore, Francesca Del Posso, Growth Marketing Strategist at Rocket Lab emphasizes the growing use of influencer marketing in mobile marketing strategies. She says that with increased mobile app usage across the world, brands need to do everything they can to reach broader audiences.
Another important point by Lee Jones, Managing Director of App Ads at Google, is that rather than companies separating web and app/mobile marketing, they should combine them by using combined KPIs across all campaigns to improve cross-collaboration and the overall success of your marketing campaigns.
Last but not least, every marketer agrees on the importance of video but only some are talking about the impact of AI video tools like Sora.
Michael Pirone, co-founder of Vidico says, “You need to keep in mind that the current mind-blowing clips you’re watching, is essentially Open AI’s public “V1” of the product. Right now is the worst the product will ever be.”
It’s important to note that tools like Sora will become the primary video tool for marketers when you set UGC aside.
Conclusion
Mobile marketing is more relevant than ever today because mobile phones take up most of the free time of users today. Instead of TVs, they are glued to their phones now.
Companies are taking advantage of that throughout multiple industries, including games, social apps, finance apps, and more.
And, with 5G becoming commonplace along with consistent technological upgrades in smartphones, brands can finally experiment with other forms of marketing content like AR, VR, and mixed reality.
Last but not least, video remains a priority in mobile marketing, garnering the most attention from users, especially UGC.
The fact remains, that successful mobile marketing is only possible through a holistic marketing approach where you combine social, content, and other relevant channels.
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