In my last article I wrote about billing options on mobile devices.
With this issue I want to discuss a very interesting topic for anyone seeking to monetize their mobile traffic targeting.
Five billion mobile phones are used worldwide, and just 20% are Smartphones!
If you are already operating a successful enterprise on the Internet I am pretty sure targeting is part of your success, and you can target much more extensively on the mobile web.
Within the previously published articles above, I provided a lot of information about mobile billing options in different countries and major differences between smartphones and non-smartphones. The question for you now is how to participate in the monetization of your mobile traffic using these advantages. Internet business operations are in a constant state of flux as trends and innovations wreak almost daily havoc with our best laid plans. Everyone has to compensate and adjust, and we are always on the lookout for additional revenue channels. Mobile presents a perfect opportunity for this but you will find Mobile to be a very fragmented business undertaking with a myriad of details to consider and account for.
I am pretty sure that many of you would say you are already in the mobile business. If this is the case then you’re already engaged in the first targeting option. You filter your mobile traffic and send it to a mobile site —or maybe you sell it to another business operator for a flat fee. If you have not already taken this first step, you must jump on the train as soon as possible because you have nothing to lose and you just could win big!
So, the first step is to filter your mobile traffic and monetize it. Everyone today has mobile, and the actual quantity is not that important. Every single additional dollar you can generate from your traffic sources helps your bottom line. Believe it or not — it can be just a matter of several minutes to get started. Sign up for a mobile program, use one of their “mobile targeting scripts” and start earning money! It sounds too easy, but it really is that simple. You can optimize your mobile strategy later, once you have more time and/or resources. One important point to remember - when you decide to redirect your mobile traffic and love your Google ranking, ensure that you accomplish this either via PHP or through .htaccess. Do not use JavaScript as Google doesn’t like it and may punish your ranking! PHP and .htaccess are both officially supported by Google!
Even if you have just a few mobile surfers on your websites each day, get active! You might think that it isn’t worth doing the redirection work, even though it is just a couple of minutes, but consider the aspect that if you don’t offer a mobile site and people enter your “normal” webpage on their mobile phone, they don’t come back! There was nothing for them to consume. The site will take way too long to load and their phone won’t support the technologies on your website. Do you think this user will come back? I don’t think so.
The next question is which types of devices do you support already? It’s great to support Smartphones, but the sheer number of non-Smartphones is still higher! Five billion mobile phones are used worldwide, and just 20% are Smartphones! So, if you want to maximize your mobile revenues you have to support non-Smartphones as well. … And forget about the prejudices you might have, people are browsing the mobile Internet on non-Smartphones, even if you don’t, didn’t, or didn’t think anyone else did.
You might want to argue that you don’t see a lot of non-Smartphones within your stats, but the reason is that many of these phones don’t show up in your stats or analytics, as the tracking software doesn’t even support the tracking technology for the non-smartphone devices.
So the next targeting option to consider is “handset-targeting.” Let’s assume you or your current partner only supports Smartphones and you send this traffic to a specific URL. This is a fine start, but what happens with all the other devices? Normally they will be sent to the same site but with the disadvantage that their phone capabilities are not sufficient to use this site.
With the “handset-targeting” option, you decide what shall happen to all the non-Smartphone surfers. You simply send them to a different site, specifically enabled to support by these handsets. You don’t cannibalize any of your current revenues, you just filter out devices which won’t be supported by your current set-up, divert them to the appropriate profit center, and make extra money with the simple process!
Let’s consider a very simple scenario to illustrate just how it works:
If we detect a Smartphone then we send it to Domain Destination 1. If we detect a non-Smartphone surfer, we send him to Domain Destination 2. Again, remember it is essential not to target via JavaScript as older devices don’t support JavaScript. If you are using JavaScript these phones and their surfers will never reach Domain Destination 2 as they simply ignore the JavaScript!
Among your mobile choices, SexGoesMobile can help you to redirect these non-Smartphones as we support 8000+ devices and have the scripts in place already for each of these older handsets, generated over our years of operation and growth through the evolution of the mobile market. Many partners have decided to send us their non-Smartphone traffic while keeping their Smartphone traffic. They’re glad they did - as we have helped them to generate more revenues from traffic that was available but not monetized!
The last targeting option is the most common one, and you are likely all doing it online — “GEO-targeting.” You are already using this technology in one way or another, either for activating additional region-specific payment methods or to send your foreign/international traffic to local affiliate programs with local sites and better conversions.
You should follow exactly the same procedure with your mobile traffic! Do you want to benefit from mobile billing? Then “GEO-targeting” is your option! I strongly recommend reading my last article in this series, “Billing options on mobile devices.” If you missed it, check your last XBIZ issue or access the XBIZ digital edition and catch up.
Where does your mobile traffic come from? Even if your U.S. mobile traffic accounts for the majority of your mobile visitors, you still have traffic from countries outside of the U.S. This is of course true in general, but especially on mobile traffic you should see surfers from regions including Europe, Africa, Asia and South America! How are you converting in these regions? Take the time to analyze it, or ask your current mobile partner to break it all down for you – and if you don’t currently have a mobile partner, get one and get moving!
I am ready to bet that you’re not converting really well in the other regions because most U.S. companies active in mobile are utilizing credit card billing on this traffic with awful conversion rates in these regions. Credit card companies are blocking a lot of countries in Asia, Africa or South America for fraud reasons.
Europe doesn’t have a large credit card penetration and people are careful where they enter their credit card details. But even if they do so, you’ll never achieve a conversion rate with credit cards in these regions to compare with mobile billing!
Another important issue when you’re using credit card billing is the income structure of a country. Most US companies don’t think about this aspect of their traffic demographics. They try to charge exactly the same price for a membership as they do in the US. But do you think that an Indian, South African or Chilean user is able to support a $20 or $30 payment for mobile porn? Obviously they are not!
So what do we do? In every one of the 50-plus countries where we’re able to offer mobile billing we follow the local beer index! This means we look at how expensive a local beer is in each individual country, and then we price the content accordingly. At least we orient ourselves on that index within each market —and we’ve had very good results with this approach.
Begin targeting your mobile traffic if you do not already do so. Review these important targeting options as you move forward.
Remember to target by device if you want to support a wider range of mobile devices, and don’t use JavaScript for redirection. Remember to target by country if you want to offer mobile billing with local pricing for the highest possible conversion rates.
In the next article topic in this series I am going to cover “The Mobile Business in Europe.” So stay tuned!
If you want to send me any questions, feedback or ideas for other articles I should write about, don’t hesitate to contact me via ck@sexgoesmobile.com or my XBIZ.net profile https://www.xbiz.net/SGMChris.
