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Mobile devices, and the influx of mobile technologies, have changed the landscape for marketers in recent years. Today, mobile content is consumed more actively than any other media types available. In fact, Mary Meeker, an analyst at Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers who reviews technology trends, predicted that mobile search would take over fixed internet searches by 2014, and her prediction wasn’t far off: According to Google, mobile surpassed desktop searches in 2015 and have soared ever since. At this point, statistics show that multi-platform use has continued to rise, with more than 75% of adult Internet users searching on both PCs and mobile devices.

Unfortunately, despite the growth in mobile searches, marketers aren’t quite keeping up when it comes to creating mobile content that converts at the same rate as desktop content. Studies estimate that smartphone content conversions are generally one third less than desktop conversions, although the conversion gap between tablets and desktops is much closer. Still, for marketers, it’s imperative to determine ways to increase mobile marketing conversions to justify mobile advertising spends.

Here are five strategies to boost conversion rates and improve ROI for your business or brand:

1. Be Consistent

Consistency is key in mobile marketing, but this doesn’t mean you can have a “set it and forget it” attitude if you expect your mobile strategy to result in higher conversions. It makes sense that if companies make regularly scheduled offers, their customers will start anticipating and engaging with them more. So you may send out an email every Monday or a special offer the first Friday of each month—however you develop a consistent offer ultimately depends on your business—and with the right offers, sent at the right times, on a regular basis, you’ll see conversion rates improve.

2. Customize

Mobile conversions are significantly higher when the user experience is customized to individual needs. According to Conversion XL, using personalized content and behavioral targeting features is not only fundamental to an online marketing strategy—it can also lead to significantly increased mobile conversions. The idea is to target content to customers based on their behavior and other factors. This allows you to create a customer experience that is engaging, interactive and tailored to the customer’s individual needs in a way that will lead to an almost certain increase in conversions.

Customization can be based on an array of variables, laid out by the marketer according to importance for the overall campaign. These variables may include:

  • Location
  • Type of device being used such as iPhone, Android device, smartphone, etc.
  • Frequency of visits (i.e. Is this a new visitor, someone who’s been to the site a few times, someone who comes daily?)
  • Where the visitor came from (Google search, Safari, another website, etc)
  • In session behavior including activity such as click-throughs and pages viewed
  • Age, gender or socioeconomic status of the searcher

Ultimately, the customer experience is based on a wide range of variables including browsing behaviors, search preferences, buying history, etc.

3. Encourage

Mobile marketing is very in tune with social media. If you’re not strategically focused on both, then you’re likely wasting a lot of time and money in the wrong areas. Consider the fact that nearly 80% of mobile web users also access social networking sites such as Facebook or Twitter from their mobile device. You can bet that increased conversions will come from any campaign that integrates social media into the strategy and encourages fans and followers to engage with your mobile campaign.

Whether you incorporate special offers to those who engage on social media or you promote a special feature of your website or your own mobile app, the engagement that you get in social networks can lead to significantly higher conversions. According to Digital Media Zone, 50% of social media users under the age of 35 are influenced to follow product or service recommendations made by their friends online. The bottom line is, you cannot afford to miss out on the conversions that are taking place as a direct result of social interaction and encouragement.

4. Embed

There are all sorts of different embedded technologies available to marketers these days: QR codes, smart images, NFC (Near Field Communication) tags, etc. These technologies are primed to increase mobile conversions in a variety of ways, but many mobile marketing professionals overlook such technology because it’s too new or because they simply don’t know enough about the tools available to them.

Effectively embedding things like QR codes and smart images into mobile marketing campaigns can deliver incentives to your visitors and lead them to interact and flow through the sales funnel. Don’t be the marketer who allows embedded technology to escape your plan—such oversight limits the potential for higher conversions and may leave you looking like you aren’t hip on the mobile hype!

5. Evolve

This again is where the “set it and forget it” attitude simply won’t do. Your marketing messages must evolve continually in order to keep the customer engaged. Consider using various attention-getters to keep your customer involved. For instance, if you have an ecommerce app, you could send push notifications to alert inactive customers to return to their shopping carts and finish their orders. Restaurants could send push notifications to customers who have their mobile apps, alerting them of happy hour specials or special events. Some customers will respond better to emails, so you may consider sending out an email, in conjunction with other marketing channel messaging, to test the effectiveness of different channels with different groups. A combination of efforts that evolve with customer behavior, and a little bit of trial and error, will result in higher conversions over time.

This article is by Brett Relander, Founder & Chief Strategy Officer at launchandhustle.com.