New technologies are revolutionizing many of our habits. Social networks and the exponential growth of smartphones and tablets have opened new channels and possibilities for brands and advertisers to reach their target audience.

Mobile advertising, the one that for many years qualified as the eternal promise of the advertising sector, seems to have found a place to consolidate. However, there are still gaps and false perceptions that keep us distant from the true reality. And is that mobile advertising, despite its different applications, is not at all the solution that many promised us.

The first reason to argue this claim lies in the experience, criteria and opinion of the users themselves. Some studies, such as the one carried out by the Direct Marketing Association,  highlight  this fact when affirming that companies that launch marketing and advertising campaigns through social media annoy users since they consider these campaigns as invaders of their privacy. That is to say, that the users themselves consider advertising on their mobile phones as something intrusive. In addition, a high percentage of these users affirms in turn that they do not want the advertising of brands in the form of advertisements to be present in their applications.

It is not an isolated opinion, much less. Another related report from AYTM Market Research states that marketing campaigns in new media are more effective than ads on mobile phones. In this research it was discovered that 46.8% of them consider mobile advertising “annoying”, 27.3% see it “intrusive”. Apart from these illuminating data, 42.8% also affirm that they have never clicked on mobile advertising on purpose.

There are no two without three. YouGov also offered us a similar vision in an own study where it affirmed that four of each five users of Smartphones found the announcements for mobiles “annoying and annoying”, knocking down with a hard blow several myths on this subject.

There will be no shortage of reports that may have the opposite opinion and whose only objective is to promote a market that seems to find more barriers than facilities. There may even seem to be a contradiction in the fact that thousands of mobile users use free applications financed by the inclusion of advertisements and in turn oppose them or consider them annoying, but is this advertising really effective? Do users pay attention to this type of ads? What about the large volume of clicks made accidentally? What is the best option for brands?

To take these issues off we must highlight some concepts, and above all, those that can make us understand in a better way, the differences between branding as a marketing strategy and the simple advertising of brands.

When we refer to Branding, we refer to the process of making and building a brand so that the strategy developed uses impacts to influence its own value on the user or consumer. In the field of mobile technology, many brands have realized their potential by developing applications that meet certain user needs or offer an added resource through them. There are thousands of example cases in all sectors. In fact, according to a study by Distimo, 91% of large brands have their own application and are present in different stores or mobile application stores. All of them with a high number of downloads for own interest of the users themselves.

The mobile advertising display in the opposite way is shown in an intrusive way. Interrupting the processes or activities of the mobile user, and in almost the majority of cases, does not generate a real impact or interest on the user. It goes unnoticed.

Industry formulas to combat these shortcomings have arisen as a result of an increase in the popularity of mobile games. Advergaming offers brands an alternative solution. It consists of the creation of playful applications created expressly to promote a product or brand. Games created by developer companies in which the brand itself plays an important role.

In-Game Advertising and Transmedia have also gained ground. In the first case with the inclusion of trademarks in the environment of the game itself. Some cases such as football videogames are a great example of this. In the case of Transmedia, we find an infinite number of applications to integrate entertainment experiences based on the same story based, for example, on films, series, etc …

The formula of the success of the mobile marketing resides in taking advantage of the own fundamental concepts of the ‘Inbound Marketing’ or ‘Marketing of Attraction 2.0’, as it emphasizes the expert Oscar Del Santo . That is, a strategy based on attraction and where the consumer is the one who arrives at the product of his own motive attracted by a message or quality content and obviously of interest.

Supporting mobile marketing is not about defending a new market established for the benefit of a few. Large groups that seek to monopolize a new and succulent market by making believe that mobile advertising is a new panacea. If we are going to take advantage of the advantages and potential of 21st Century technologies, let’s bet on strategies and formulas of the 21st Century.