45% of Marketers Are Deploying Mobile Apps to Enhance Customer Engagement

As marketers continue to embrace mobile, a new report suggests that they are seeing the benefits of connecting to their audience through apps.

The “Quantifying The Rise of Mobile Apps & The Value of Deep Linking” report from The Relevancy Group and Branch discovered that nearly 45 percent of marketing professionals are deploying apps to enhance customer engagement. More than 40 percent are using apps to build loyalty, and about the same percentage are using them to drive sales.

When gauging effectiveness in terms of driving revenue, mobile apps were fourth on the list of channels. Apps were surpassed by the overall efficiency of display advertising, social media marketing and email marketing.

“Email marketing remains an important part of your marketing efforts,” says Todd Patton at Branch. “Email is the best channel to directly reach potential customers and loyal supporters.”

Email Marketing Effectiveness and Level of Difficulty

Email is a key tactic within a digital marketer’s toolbox, and it may be because of its ease of use. The “State of Digital Marketing – Benchmarks for Success” study published by Adestra in partnership with Ascend2 has found that 61 percent of marketers consider email marketing to be their most effective tactic, and only 23 percent believe it is the most difficult to execute.

Email marketing was third-to-last in difficulty, just ahead of website marketing (17 percent) and display ads (21 percent). Social media (48 percent) appears to be the most challenging marketing tactic to execute. Approximately 38 percent of marketers said that mobile marketing was the most difficult to execute.