Reading in Intergrated Marketing Communication - Research Paper Example

Reading in integrated marketing communication Abstract With the diversified adoption of technology in communication, marketing has since benefited from the same. Marketing has revolutionary changed from the traditional print adverts to electronic and online campaigns. Both the sellers and the consumers have adopted online marketing based on the advantage of accessing online marketing services that are available in both wireless and mobile communication networks. The advantage of this form of marketing to markets is the advantage of reaching and making contact with each consumer individually. With these averages and potential, there are several challenges that come with mobile marketing; security in making payments, guarantee of the said products in form and design, turnaround time and privacy of consumer information, data, and details. This study will seek to establish what several writers have said about these matters and any other arising issues then identify the information gaps regarding the issues. These risks will be addressed with regard to mobile applications, QR codes and web 2.0 and any other marketing tool operating on mobile platforms. Introduction Mobiles are most common forms of advertising today and the highest growing form of shopping (Munteanu, 2011). This form of marketing communication is widely used based on five factors. Ubiquity; mobiles are available everywhere and anytime. Reach ability; A marketer is guaranteed of reaching the target consumer so long as the mobile device is on and the act is under real-time status. Convenience; the environment within which the user and the mobile device operate in is one of ease and it is this which mobile marketers rely on for convenience. Connectivity; in most cases, the connection of a mobile device to the internet and to the network is instant. Lastly, content-sensitivity; in most cases, the mobile app is able to sense the kind of content the user is trafficking and presenting adverts which are in the same content-line. Today, most information gets shared through the internet and applications are the current tools of this mode of communication (Benou & Bitos, 2008). Promotion of this is by the milestones made recently in the wireless and mobile communication technologies. As marketing is all about communication and the message to be communicated target to each individual consumer, mobiles present the most appropriate form of marketing communication. The advantage of mobiles which has made them the perfect choice for marketers is that everyone has his or her own. Mobiles are also portable and because every person walks around with a mobile, one can get reached regardless of where they are so long as there is network coverage (Bellman, 2011). To reach this reach consumer pool, several tools have undergone developments that operate on the mobile platform. These include the web 2.0. Quick Response codes, mobile applications and short message services. These are the most common used in mobile marketing and they have proven to be resourceful. These are specific to mobiles. The recent advances in wireless and mobile communication technologies enable users to conduct commercial activities anywhere and at any time. With the development of Smart phones and tablets, mobile marketing made a big leap in the direction of increased effectiveness. A timeline in the development of mobile market has been included in the appendix. Even though mobile marketing has been extensively adopted for advertising, it has not equally sunk into the consumer. According to Munteanu (2011), consumers have not adopted mobile marketing and mobile driven trading related processes because of several reservations about these mobile systems. These reservations include security in making payments, privacy of one’s details, the turnaround time, and general uncertainty (Wong, & Hsu, 2008). These issues are spread across the various services offered by mobile marketing services including mobile advertising, mobile trading, mobile payments, and shopping and customer relationship management services (CRM). Security of payments is a challenge that comes when the consumer has to pay for products. According to statistics given by Parry (2012), it is evident that the use of credit cards instead of money is still low. Security in a concern attributed to risk taking as one does not want to make a payment without first authenticating the credibility of the site. For online shops, this challenge has contributed to most new online shops not picking at all, as consumers need to first establish the credibility of the online shop. Consumers are concerned with sending money to online scams or swindlers in the name of making purchase. The most common form of mobile payments is in the form of credit cards. These cards have numbers and customer names that are the key to using the card. In any case where these details leak out, the customer at question stands a great risk of being swindled of their money. It therefore means that, the privacy of these details is of great concern. Consumers are slow in using mobile payment systems and customer management systems as they consider their details exposed with these systems. According to Foley (2010), this challenge more pronounced in the conventional societies. This challenge most spelled in mobile banking where the account holder feels that, their account details are prone to public exposure when used in the mobile banking systems. Turnaround time is a challenge that comes with mobile pricing and shopping. According to freedman (2011), mobile shopping which can also get reference to as online shopping is common with females and consumers between the age of 24 years and 30 years. The most common forms of online shopping are in retail, in making reservations, participation in auctions and the biggest percentage of online shopping is in tickets. Out of these, only retail shopping might have products shipped. Because consumers are not certain of the time it will take the product for shipping, they do not opt for mobile shopping often. The other challenges summed up as general uncertainties include the risk of getting a different item from the one ordered especially in scams where the products displayed on the online display pages (representing physical show/display rooms) are completely different to the ones on the shelves. The other problem is fear that is common to first-time online shoppers, bankers and those making payments (Kesaji, 2012). Based on the discussion above, it is clear that security, privacy and turnaround time as well as other general concerns are of major concern to mobile marketing. This research will therefore seek to address the issues by exploring what other writers have written about the issues and lastly, make a conclusion Objectives of the research The primary objective of this research is to explore what other writers have said about security and privacy of consumer payments and details respectively in mobile marketing. This will be concluded with a statement of the state of these primary concerns in the current mobile marketing industry and recommendation of the way forward. The secondary objectives will be to; determine what other issues concerning mobile marketing referenced authors have given primary concern, determine what other issues are affecting the adoption of mobile marketing and lastly, to determine which mobile marketing function is most affected by these issues. Literature review Mobile applications “apps” According to Bellman (2011) and freeman (2011), mobile marketing has become more popular the growth is continuous. The main forms of mobile marketing addressed by these two authors are mobile adverting and mobile shopping. Currently, these two aspects are run with the help of mobile applications that are run on the appropriate mobile platform; Smart phones or tablets (Freeman, 2011). Before the introduction of mobile apps, the common form of mobile marketing was through mobile short message services. To the consumer, the mobile owner, this adverting system was the most notorious in intrusion of user’s privacy. The messages could get sent even to willing and unwilling consumer. According to Brick (2012), this form of mobile marketing was most prevalent in 2005. With the introduction of mobile apps in 2007 (Brick, 2012), mobile marketing has since then been increasing increasingly (Wilson, 2006). With applications, the problem of privacy intrusion continued with mobile adverts sent to the customer without prior permission from the customer (Farber, 2009). The issue of privacy hinders mobile advertising because, no matter well the advert is designed, is customers do not have the confidence of their privacy being upheld, they will ignore these adverts regardless of the additional possibilities they might present. Mobiles have also shown to intrude on user’s privacy by illegal means. One of these is through tracking of cookies generated from the user’s mobiles. The right adverting strategy is keeping track of traffic generated from the mobile when the user accesses the internet, to generate search engine optimization (SEO) strategies (Farber, 2009). Tracking cookies is illegal and it infringes the mobile user privacy. Apps have been shown by Bellman et al (2011) to be a security risk. This is when advertisers opt to the use of illegal methods like black hat SEO. When you click on a link on an advert, it should direct you to the direct external page, but some mobile markets will tap this link and direct it to their pages. In such a way, the mobile user lands on a page that they never intended, posing a security threat. The other way through which mobile apps are a security threat is when they keep memory of the user sensitive details (Benou & Bitos, 2008). Even though some apps will required a confirmation to remember or not, some will automatically remember. The details in question include usernames and passwords. If by any chance an ill-intended person gets hold of the mobile, they are sure to access the mobile owner’s accounts. According to Bellman et al (2011), apps have a higher persuasive power and they in most cases, cause an intent-shift to purchase of the product. This is risky as in most cases, consumers have resulted to purchase of irreverent products. This confirms the fear by many that, the image of the product on the app advert may not be what is actually on the self. Even though according to Farber (2009), some consumers shy away from mobile shopping because of unappealing products images, they can also have an opposite effect. According to Farber (2009), as apps dominate the world of mobile marketing, it is important as a consumer to understand what is stake. As per the statistics in freeman (2011), females are the majority in the use of apps for shopping and they respond positively to app adverts more than male. Even though the issue of convenience is a major factor, the best way to stay safe is by conducting a slight market research to establish the credibility of the store, the cost in comparison to other and the security level to avoid falling victim of online frauds. QR codes According to Kelly & O'Brien (2011), QR codes are a very potent source of privacy and security risk. QR codes are designed to transfer data using mobile devices that then obviously means there is the risk of privacy and security infringement. Fu (2011) states that, even though user permission is required to access user data, browser history, to track GPS information and read or write data as well as access camera, there are high risks of this information landing on malicious software or ending on fraudulent web pages. This presents both a security and privacy risks as first, your personal information is exposed and where the information lands, it poses a security risk. Kesaji (2012) indicates that, when scanning QR codes with a Smartphone, it is rewarding to be a little more careful and not scan every other code you come across. Fraudsters, pranksters, and hackers are nowadays placing QR codes in public places intentionally to trap those careless or just curious QR code scanners. When you perform the scan, your mobile device is under phishing attack or it might get directed to down load malware to your mobile device. This is a security risk as this download might undergo use to track you down or extract your personal data and send it to the tricksters. Okazaki et al (2011) reckons; to stay safe from these concealed attacks, it is wise not to scan a QR code if it does not include a textual description of where it links. Looking the barcode alone one can never tell what information is contained in the matrix. According to Foley (2010), the main factor used to expose Smartphone uses through mobile marketing is curiosity. To make the most out of this, tricksters employ their tricks to attack-tag your device. Once a Smartphone or iOS devices user scans the barcode, the trickster gains access to the personal data contained in the mobile device. Normally, even though QR codes are legitimate and well-intended mobile marketing tools, they have more than often used cunningly and maliciously by fraudsters to access personal data. Data theft is the other major risk that comes with QR codes (Kesaji, 2012). QR codes allow two devices to communicate and transact data, but it has been shown that, a third device can intercept this data and perform any one of three main threats; modify, corrupt or insert additional data. In cases where personal data is at risk, the data concerned includes contact information, browser history and sensitive data like usernames and passwords, this is a risk to privacy. If the user uses his or her mobile device to make cash transactions, then it is a security risk. According to Okazaki et al (2011), QR codes have no future. Two main reason support this argument; first, they are too venerable to fraudsters to be trusted even when used in a well intended manner and second, most Smartphone and iPhone users do not know how to operate these codes. In addition, those who know are reluctant and use then especially after the curiosity has died out. Several strategies are proposed to help consumers not fall victims to cons. Parry (2011) recommends that business could give their customers precise details of their legitimate barcodes. Secondly, customers should learn not to scan every other barcode they come across as well as seemingly legitimate barcodes as they might not be. Web 2.0 Web 2.0 provides a platform on which mobiles websites with more features like storage space, data transfer capability and instant messaging capability (Cătoiu & Adrian, 2010). This is why it presents a good mobile marketing opportunity. In the midst of these advantages, there are serious risks that are concerned with the security and privacy of the user/consumer/ according to Wong and Hsu (2008), the fact that consumer data can be stored in the web 2.0 is by itself a risk on security. Web 2.0 can be hacked with the use of SQL therefore information stored in web 2.0 sites is a just a click away from a hacker, third party. The other threat of web 2.0 hosted websites in during maintenance of the site (Wilson, 2006). Normally, providers concentrate on the uptime and ease of access to information that they will lose grip of customer data. In such a way, they do not give sufficient consideration of how the data will be stored or backed. This results to lose of customer stored data. On the other hand, with the lack of authentic and firm data storage systems, third parties can easily access this data hence customer privacy is broken. In cases where service is interrupted, it is normally beyond the customer’s control. This is also the case in cases where connectivity is down (Wilson, 2006). Service interruptions as well as connectivity problems have the potential to put customer at work. In mobile marketing, this affects customers in that; if this happens in the middle of a transaction, it is interrupted and it might require initiation of the process all over again when connectivity resumes. Other issues The issue of frauds is real and major in mobile marketing. This is particularly of more concern when customers have to engage in money transfer events like mobile enabled payments, mobile banking, and mobile shopping (Heinonen & Strandvik, 2003). The fear that one’s money may be lost in the process is real and common especially among the conventional societies and first-time mobile money transfers. It is undeniable that mobile marketing especially shopping and payments have not been up to the expected levels. Even though they are still growing and the number of those opting for mobile shopping increasing month after month (Freeman, 2011), there are strong hindrances that make shoppers shy away from the technology. One of these is the perception that still the traditional physical shopping is still superior and mobile shopping does not equate to this form of marketing. According to Li (1999), the common consumer preferences that are enjoyed in traditional shopping; shape, color and texture which are all attributes of packaging are not optimally enjoyed in mobile marketing. Even though marketers and product package designers for online marketing are adopting 3D shapes for the online displays, they still do not go as physical display does. Wong and Hsu (2008) state; the way in which products details is presented in mobile marketing is the main challenge for mobile shoppers. One of the items for studying in this report is turnaround time. Suggestions state that this affects consumer preference in making mobile shopping. There is however, no writers among the ones referenced who consider this to be a challenge in the adoption of mobile marketing strategies. Conclusion Conclusions are that security and privacy are the two most common risks that come with mobile marketing. Even though mobile apps are the most common form of mobile marketing today, they pose the greatest number of security and privacy risks. Adverts sent to the perceived customer without prior authorization from the customer. Apps that keep memory of user details specifically usernames and passwords pose the risk of privacy and security if then this data lands with a third party. Some apps in the market today are relying on illegal strategies that include black hat and tracking of cookies to send adverts to customers. With these strategies, it is established that none of the references made has any strategies to solve the privacy and security issues that come with mobile apps. In addition, it is determines that there is increased adoption of mobile apps, not because they are becoming safe, but because customers are developing appreciation of mobile marketing as the best alternative to physical marketing. QR codes may appear to be the most risky mobile marketing tools based on the privacy and security risks exposed. They access user information and they are most likely to be used by fraudsters. However, going by the usage and the future prospects of barcodes, it is not a not considered as the most risky mobile marketing strategy. Only those who are curious of scanning every other barcode are prone to the risks posed by QR codes. Even though the referenced materials do not give an in-depth analysis of QR codes, it is understandable as they are gradually edging out of popular mobile marketing strategies. Web 2.0 posses some security and privacy issues. The most common being interruptions and connectivity issues that may result to personal data exposed to third parties or being lost. Web 2.0 also poses a privacy risk when unknowingly users put up information on social media sites that they could not otherwise tell a strategy. There however seems to be an information gap concerning web 2.0 as not much concerning security to consumers is given in the materials referenced. The other issued raised in the discussion; turnaround time, consumer preferences as in traditional physical marketing and conscious of making payments are not given prominence in the referenced materials. It is therefore clear that security, privacy, turnaround time and consumer preferences still take center stage in mobile marketing. They raise critical concerns and there is little or no documented information concerning the status of the issues in the industry as well as possible strategies to curb the risks. Hence, the study with primary objective being security and privacy of consumer payments, and turnaround time and customer preferences being secondary objectives is vital for the continued success of mobile marketing. References Bellman, S., Potter, R.F., Hassard, S.T., Robinson, J.A. & Varan, D. (2011). The Effectiveness of Branded Mobile Phone Apps. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 25(4), 191-200. Retrieved from: http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/science/article/pii/S1094996811000491 Benou, P., Bitos, V. (2008). Developing Mobile Commerce Applications, Journal of Electronic Commerce in Organizations, 6(1), 63-78. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/236482093/fulltextPDF?accountid=13380 BuyWithMe Adds Android App to Suite of Mobile Offerings. (2011). Business And Economics, Beauty Culture. Para.6. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/879445008 Farber, Alex. (2009). Mobile app ads cause concern for advertisers. New Media Age, p.1-2. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/963541355 Foley, J. (2010). QR Codes: Making Print and Mail Interactive. Business And Economics, Photography, Printing, 60(12), 22, 24-25, 39. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/819397135 Freedman, L. (2011). The “Shopping“Mindset of the Mobile Consumer. 3-19. Retrieved from: http://shopcoffeetable.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/e-Tailing-Whitepaper-March-2011.pdf Fu, L. (2011). Design of QR Code-based Mall Shopping Guide System. International Conference on Information Science and Technology, 26-28. Retrieved from: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/login.jsp?tp=&arnumber=5765288&url=http%3A%2F%2Fieeexplore.ieee.org%2Fxpls%2Fabs_all.jsp%3Farnumber%3D5765288 Kelly, S, & O'Brien, F. (2011). QR codes: Are they worth the investment? Advertising And Public Relations, 33(1), 25. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/845200395 Kesaji, N. (2012). Decipher the Code. Business And Economics--Marketing And Purchasing, 15(2), 34. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/963541355 Miyasaki, A. (2001). Consumer perceptions of privacy and security risks for online shopping, Business And Economics, Consumer Education And Protection, 35(1), 27-44. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/195907634 Okazaki, S., Navarro, A. & Nicolas, C.L. (2011). Assessing gender differences in QR code loyalty promotion acceptance. The Service Industries Journal. 1-13. Retrieved from: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02642069.2011.623775 Parry, T. (2011). Why Catalogers Should Try QR Codes, Advertising And Public Relations, Publishing And Book Trade. Para. 2. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/863371437 Wilson, J. (2006). 3G to Web 2.0? Can Mobile Telephony Become an Architecture of Participation? The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 12(2), 229-242. Doi: 10.1177/1354856506066122. Retrieved from: http://con.sagepub.com/content/12/2/229.full.pdf+html Wong, Y. K. & Hsu, C. J. (2008). A confidence-based framework for business to consumer (B2C) mobile commerce adoption. Personal and Ubiquitous Computing, 12(1), 77-84. Doi: 10.1007/s00779-006-0120-5. Retrieved from: http://search.proquest.com.ezp01.library.qut.edu.au/docview/208953090 Heinonen, K. & Strandvik, T. (2003). Consumer responsiveness to mobile marketing. Hanken Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration, Helsinki, Finland. Retrieved from: http://www.ebusinessforum.gr/old/content/downloads/CONSUMER_RESPONSIVENESS_TO_MOBILE_MARKETING.pdf on 11 October 2012 Cătoiu, I. & Adrian, D. G. (2010). Romanian consumer perception towards mobile marketing campaigns Annales Universitatis Apulensis Series Oeconomica, 12(2). Retrieved from: http://www.oeconomica.uab.ro/upload/lucrari/1220102/25.pdf on 11 October 2012 Munteanu, C. (ed.) (2011). Marketing Theory Challenges in Emerging Societies. Conference Proceedings: Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi. Retrieved from: http://www.emac-regional.com/volum_ULTRA_FINAL.pdf on 11 octomber 2012 Brick, J. (2012). A Brief History of Mobile Marketing, Ez texting. Retrieved from http://www.eztexting.com/sms-marketing-resources/tips-tricks-articles/history-mobile-marketing.html Li, H., Cheng, K. & Martha, G.R. (1999). The Impact of Perceived Channel Utilities, Shopping Orientations, and Demographics on the Consumer's Online Buying Behavior. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 5, 2, restive from: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.1999.tb00336.x/full Appendix Table showing the developments in mobile marketing Middle Ages: "Town criers" – young boys who run through the streets shouting messages to all – are commonly hired to broadcast announcements. 19th century: Traveling salesmen hawk wares from household gadgets to tonic cures from brightly painted covered wagons. 1876: Bell introduces the telephone at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. By 1886, there are more than 150,000 telephones in the United States. 1925: Goodyear's first blimp, The Pilgrim, takes to the air emblazoned with the Goodyear name and logo. 1930s: Custom-built cars in the shape of hot dogs, peppermint rolls, lighters and more tour the country to build brand awareness before "brand awareness" even became a trade term. 1965: MIT's CTSS MAIL, the first true email system, goes online. 1967: Lester Wunderman coins the term "direct marketing" to describe direct mail and telemarketing initiatives used for at least 15 years prior to this date. The exact date of the first direct mail campaign and first telemarketing call were never recorded. 1973: Martin Cooper invents the portable telephone handset. It won't see mass market appeal for 20 years. 1992: Neil Papworth sends the first text message, from his computer to Richard Jarvis's mobile phone. 1993: First mobile phone capable of sending and receiving text is introduced. 1994: QR codes invented by Denso Wave, used originally to track Toyotas during manufacturing. 1996: First mobile web access via cellular phone introduced on the Nokia 9000 Communicator model 1998: "Spam" as a slang term for unsolicited email marketing, is added to the Oxford English Dictionary. 1999: SMS messages can now be sent between users on different wireless providers. 2003: First commercial mobile SMS service launches. 2003: Introduction of short codes for use with text message marketing. 2005: Major brands launch major SMS campaigns, including Nike's Times Square design campaign and the Pontiac Spot a G6 giveaway. 2005: ICANN approves the .mobi top-level web domain, backed by Google, Microsoft, Visa and a host of mobile telecom providers 2007: Apple releases the iPhone in the United States. 2007: The number of active SMS users worldwide reaches 2.4 billion. 2007: Number of average U.S. text messages per month (218) exceeds the average U.S. phone calls per month (213). 2010: Cambridge Dictionary adds "text" as a verb, meaning to send a text message. 2010: QR codes begin seeing wide usage as part of mobile marketing. 2011: 40 percent of U.S. mobile users report that they regularly use mobile devices to browse the Internet. 2011: Mobile platforms consume more than $14 billion worth of media, including $9.3 billion worth of music alone Tabled sourced from Brick (2012). 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