While investment remains minimal, mobile has achieved a level of “ubiquity” in Canadian marketing according to a new study from the Association of Canadian Advertisers (ACA).
The new Marketer’s Pulse study, based on email interviews with 56 senior marketers conducted between Jan. 7-31, found that 41.8% of respondents are currently using mobile as a marketing channel, while another 49.1% are just beginning to explore its potential.
Only 9.1% of respondents indicated that they don’t consider mobile a priority at this time.
“It is definitely high on marketers’ radar,” said Susan Charles, the ACA’s vice-president of membership services. “Marketers have greater ability to be in the right place, right time than they did before. Mobile is the new game-changer.”
But while mobile is gaining in stature, there remains considerable room for growth. The ACA’s soon-to-be-released Marketing Communications Expenditure Survey, based on a two-month survey that concluded in December, found that mobile is expected to comprise only about 1.8% of marketers’ total spend in fiscal 2013.
Mobile is one of the industry’s fastest-growing marketing channels however, with its share of the overall spend projected to increase from 0.8% in fiscal 2012. “While it’s small potatoes, we do know that it will be huge going forward,” said Charles. “It’s not about the [dollar value], it’s about its presence.”
The Marketer’s Pulse study also found that marketers are optimistic about their company’s business outlook, with 55.6% of respondents indicating that they expect sales/revenue to increase over the next six months, a marked increase from 33.3% of respondents in September.
Just over 28% of respondents said they expected their consumers’ confidence level to improve over the next six months, up from 20.4% in September, while 32.7% expect their marketing budget to increase over the same period, up from 29.2%.
The full Marketer’s Pulse survey is available free to ACA members and panel participants, and also by subscription.
