Euro Consumers More Responsive To Mobile Ads Than US Shoppers

We keep coming across reports predicting impressive growth in mobile advertising over the next few years. Such publications undoubtedly leave marketers all a-tingle but let me share something that may cool some of that enthusiasm, or at least give companies a serious reason to apply themselves with great diligence to their mobile strategies.

The latest report comes from Nielsen, which has found that US consumers are much less likely to be influenced by mobile ads than their European peers.

The consumer research group polled mobile device owners from the US, the UK, Germany and Italy. It turned out that just 16% of US consumers in possession of a tablet used it to make a purchase after seeing a mobile ad. The proportion fell to a tiny 6% in the case of smartphone owners. In contrast, Germans and Italians were more readily pushed into buying action by a mobile ad although they did not necessarily use the same device to make their purchase. In the UK, a nation greatly enamoured of mobile gadgets, the proportion for tablet owners was the same as in the US but 14% of British smartphone owners said they were more likely to buy a product after seeing an advertisement on the device.

Despite their different reception of mobile ads, consumers from all four countries shared a preference for doing their ad-driven shopping from a personal computer. Possible explanations include the ease of viewing factor and concerns over mobile security. What advertisers need to consider with regard to the former is how to make their mobile marketing messages short and to the point but with enough zing to render them memorable.