Mobile marketing brought brands closer to consumers, allowing communication throughout the day (and night) no matter where they were. This created the ‘always-connected’ consumer and gave businesses the ability (privilege) to communicate their messages to consumers all the time. This was abused by many businesses, who bombarded customers, generating the need for more types of mobile marketing channels, which were in turn, abused too.

Mobile allowed us to reach consumers in a very personal way. The mobile phone is always in the possession of the consumer and therefore this is a very personal way of communicating. Impersonal communication can easily break the bond.

Wearable technology isn’t quite booming yet, with only early adopters showing an interest, but when it does take off, we will no doubt see marketers jump on the new available channels. For social media marketing, which has been poorly used by many on mobile, wearables brings us even more closely to the consumer, which if executed poorly could cause consumers to become fed up very quickly.

Therefore, as we near the time when wearable technology becomes the norm, it is likely that social media practices from a marketing perspective will change, as we need to take into account, the different user behaviours and the proximity of the tech to the end-user.

It is likely that many businesses will continue their current social media marketing strategy in the same way, and will therefore get either poor results at first, or scare off their consumers / community members.

How do you think social media marketing will change with the emergence of wearables? We spoke to a number of marketers and business owners for their thoughts:

Cameron Conaway, Content Marketing Manager at Flow
“Wearable tech means that many marketers scrambling to figure out how to be ‘on’ their potential customers will quickly be seen as intrusive and will ultimately fail. The brands that sustainably create useful and engaging content (while not interrupting) will prove most successful.”

Brandon Baker, Owner at Loveletter Cakeshop
“The key difference between marketing on wearable tech vs conventional methods is in the urgency. People take their phones everywhere, but it can take hours before you’re notified of your favorite company’s promotion on a desktop or smartphone. Because consumers are literally wearing a smartwatch 24/7, they’re the perfect vehicle to deliver messages that you want your market to act upon instantly.”

Steve Miller, Account Executive at Brolik
“I do not think wearable devices will host ads the same way our other devices do because the relationship between the device and your senses is too intimate. I do think that the data wearables collect will be used by third parties to make ads more relevant on *other* devices. Health info, habits, and location patterns will all be used to serve ads that our current devices need us to expressly show interest in.”

Babak Hafezi, MA MBA, CEO of HafeziCapital International Consulting & Investing
“Wearables and Social Media: Dear Patrick: Yes they will in specific sectors. I have talked to a number of lawyers who love wearables because in court they can keep up with the office, whereas currently they are not allow to check e-mail on a smart phone. I believe that this will translate to market and social presence. Wearable will further the integration and participation in Social media and will be another avenue to expand the client interaction.”

BY PATRICK MACGOUGAN

Read more at: http://go-mashmobile.com/technology-2/toolkit-technology-2/social-media-marketing-and-wearable-tech-9311/