Online advertising isn’t a desktop experience anymore
Mobile content has grown so exponentially that online advertising is “no longer a desktop experience,” says Scott Goodstein, founder and CEO of the mobile firm Revolution Messaging.
The rapid expansion of mobile in the campaign space was one of the most important developments over the course of the 2012 election cycle and advertisers need to do a better job of adjusting by making their online content mobile-based.
Goodstein, who served as Obama’s external online director during his 2008 campaign, made the push for an increased focus on mobile during a Social Media Week Panel on Tuesday hosted by NGP VAN in Washington, D.C. Speaking alongside Goodstein was Tammy Gordon, V.P. of social communication at AARP.
“At AARP we don’t build anything that is not mobile with responsive design,” noted Gordon.
With responsive design, webpages adjust to the size of the viewer’s screen. It’s different from many organizations which simply employ separate sites for mobile users—something Goodstein says hinders the user experience.
“It’s hard enough for organizations to take care of their website, now they have to take care of a second mobile site,” he said. “Having two websites is not the right user experience. Being able to have that mobile experience work is going to be more and more important.”
The best starting point: getting your organization in a mobile mindset so that people are thinking of ways to enhance the experience of those visiting your site.
“How many people are coming to your website from a mobile device each month?” asked Goodstein. “What is the user experience they’re getting on the site? It is as simple as can they find your phone number?”
Instead of online users browsing the web at home on their computers, so many more are now accessing the Internet on their daily commute.
“[The experience] is now ‘I’m sitting on a bus for two hours during a commute,” said Goodstein. “Figuring that out, being able to serve video to a person, being able to serve advertising to that person on their daily commute is something that we couldn’t do politically five years ago but today we can be.”