Today there are 4.333 billion active Internet users in the world. Of that number, more than 80% are accessing the Internet via their mobile devices. That’s 3.937 billion. In other words, over half of the world’s total population are mobile Internet users, according to DataReportal Digital 2019: Internet Trends in Q3 2019 report.
People spend more time tinkering with their mobile devices than they watch the TV. For instance, the average US adult spends 3 hours and 43 minutes on a mobile device, compared to 3 hours and 35 minutes watching TV.
With so much time spending on their mobile phones and other devices, people inevitably leave a lot of data behind. Data that, if there was a smart mobile marketer around, could be very useful.
However, it is becoming more and more difficult to navigate all this data, especially as it always grows. A mobile marketer could get lost in this huge and constantly growing database.
Fortunately, data science is there to save the day.
What is Data Science
Data science is capable of revealing useful insights for any business, including those that rely on mobile marketing.
A good data scientist can detect the burning questions, use a variety of different sources of data, organize the information he got from those data sources into results, use those results to create solutions and communicate his or her findings in a manner that helps drive business decisions forward.
To understand data science better, we need to also understand its life cycle. There are five stages of the data science life cycle, according to Berkeley. These are:
- Capture
- Maintain
- Process
- Communicate
- Analyze
Put together, they look something like this:
As a field that deals with systems and processes that we can use to gather insight and knowledge into huge quantities of data, data science has, in a relatively short time, made a big impact on several big industries, including mobile.
There are a number of reasons why this is the case, but the biggest are:
- Data science helps companies better understand their customers
- It also allows them to communicate their story more clearly
- Another way data science, through big data, is helping organizations is that it helps them solve problems more effectively
- Results and findings gathered from data science can be used and applied in practically every industry
- Finally, data science is not exclusive to just one industry. It is available to almost all of them and using that data can be beneficial for organizations that use it
Impact on Mobile Marketing
So, what of the impact of data science on mobile marketing?
Today, it is practically impossible to hide a secret from big tech companies.
They know practically everything about you from your personal information, where you live and where you are located, are you married, where you work and how much you earn, your race, sex, gender, religion, political beliefs, banking and financial data, your IP address, your search history, chat history, calendar events, what ads you clicked on, what items you purchased online and so on.
Yes, it’s really scary how much big tech companies know about us, but how do they get all this information?
By using data science, of course. It helps them predict (and very accurately, let’s add) their visitor’s and consumer’s behavior and further make suggestions on what to see, buy or do next.
For instance, if you ever managed to stay away from Twitter for a couple of days (congratulations on that, by the way), you probably noticed the “while you were away” feature. That’s Twitter’s data science team using machine learning to predict which tweets would be relevant and interesting to you based on your behavior and interests.
But, it’s not just big companies and marketing agencies that can and do benefit from mobile marketing. Both small and large agencies can use SMS marketing services to deliver information to their customer base at a moment’s notice.
How does Data Science Help Mobile Marketing?
There are obviously many ways it can help and organization, but the biggest include:
- Segmenting customers
Customers are individuals. They need to be treated as such. This can mean segmenting them based on their sex, background, or something else and providing each a unique experience. With data science, this can be achieved with much more success.
- Demand forecasting
One of the biggest problems companies often face is how to accurately predict their demand. Predict too low and you won’t be able to serve all your customers. Too high and you are left with a surplus that you don’t know what to do with. Using data science and analytics, however, companies can much more accurately predict their demand and reduce cash flow problems.
Takeaways
While mobile overtakes desktop devices, it becomes increasingly important to have accurate data at your disposal. Without it, it will become more and more difficult to simply reach your customers and audience.
Fortunately, data science can help a lot with this, but only if you regularly maintain your database and not let it decay.
Guest post courtesy of Jennifer Houghton
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