Can we blame ‘mobile bob’?

Gary Cole, commercial director, O2 Media, says the consumer and the environment is changing at such dramatic pace that if agencies don’t start seriously considering mobile, their communications strategy or media plan will be dramatically less effective…

… Well, I’m afraid the answer is an unequivocal yes. Agencies that structure their media planning and buying function around a single mobile ‘specialist’ are setting themselves a time bomb in client development and agency progression. And it will blow up sooner than they think, when they realise that some agencies and some trophy clients have been beavering away behind their backs and will be ready to pounce during that routine re-pitch later this year. Don’t tell me in Q4 that I didn’t warn you. Because these more progressive agencies do exist within the big networks and the clients that demand radical mobile integration into their media are increasing each period.

I will end this article by reaffirming this latter point. Because far from being the kind of digital evangelist/annoying oik who some of you may think I might be (you know the type… one eyed drum banging on after dosing up on the sparkly next big thing – Pininterest yawn – and re-tweets from Tech Crunch, especially the -8 hour GMT threads), I want to stress a healthy and honest dose of realism in this short column today about the pace of environmental and consumer change vs the ineffectual ‘token gesture’ some marketing and agency professionals are paying to mobile at the moment.

Anyway, so back to my pal one man bob. The caricature of my (and probably my media owner peers’) single biggest frustration at the moment. Often the bright, somewhat nerdy, very likeable, know it all, who has excelled in some kind of sexy online attritional analysis unit, emerging technologies role or both. And has recently been promoted to the head of mobile. With a team of none, limited client exposure and very limited influence into his or her internal planning community, press, broadcast or content/sponsorship teams. I think you know where I’m going with this, so hold that thought whilst I share some earthy, simple and quite genuine trends. And no, they’re not from Tech Crunch.

Firstly, I just want reinforce some well versed news. In 2011 the mobile ad sector witnessed huge growth, but this totalled a Specsaver-appointment-inducing 0.5% of UK ad spend. The dial may double this year, but it won’t make a big dent in the pie. Contrast this with the very real explosion of a) owning a smartphone b) using this smartphone as your primary screen for internet usage, with apps, mobile sites and/or search. A little secret I’ll share with you here is that all operators are not public around smartphone statistics and data usage (we have our reasons, I’m sure you can figure some of them out). However in my humble opinion, Pareto’s law is kicking in nicely. And most of this growth is driven from second smartphone ownership ‘hand me downs’.

If we also factor in the aggressive roll out installation of free and powerful wifi services by my O2 wifi colleagues and Sky’s The Cloud, plus the imminent roll out of ‘broadband power’ on your phone (something called LTE or 4G, you can ask you resident head of mobile or I recommend watching a fantastically informative 15 minute clip on bbc.co.uk/click from two weeks ago) then we have a market on the move.

In context my mum, a contented retiree, has a blackberry curve. She now has a burning appetite to upgrade to keep apace with my 11 year nephew, her grandson. Not to mention her retiree neighbours showing off their iPhone 3, which is in fact, a cast off from their son or daughter who have recently upgraded. So if smartphone addiction has hit my mum, it’s only a question of time before the mainstay of her internet usage (needs must, let’s be honest) will be on her handset. Don’t worry Daily Mail, my dad will forever be happy with his Nokia, and many like him will, so your readership numbers won’t be affected for some time yet. Note I didn’t talk about my brother and how his wife (very normal non-media industry people you’ll be pleased to know) because they’re already part of the smartphone craze and are most probably the target for most traditional campaigns.

I’ll be honest, it’s also hampering media owners who are serious about fast tracking mobile into the planning process as well (to feed the agency cynics reading this, yes it is also making my life terribly difficult to deliver the high growth demands made of my board and worst still, seriously hindering my high hopes of a nice holiday for me and the missus later this year).

Final thought, no-one ever got sacked for buying TV. Well that’s true, and still may hold true for a very long time. And I am not suggesting the demise of TV, far from it. My ITV experience taught me one thing, I certainly worked for the media leader in advertising. What I am saying is that the consumer and the environment is changing at such dramatic pace, that if you don’t start seriously considering mobile into your ‘re-planning’ or integrating mobile into your media planning this year I am suggesting that by 2013 your new communications strategy or media plan will be dramatically less effective. And your client may even experience some erosion into their market share. Maybe both.

We shouldn’t really blame one man bob, we should blame ourselves for not doing something about it this year. You know where to find me if you need some guidance… and I will tell you how I would run a media agency next month.