How to pitch mobile websites

Show them the search statistics and how many people are using smart devices like iphone and andriod.

I would make a one page mobile site for the client with all the links done but not active and show them the difference.

Push the benefits of the QR code attracting visitors when they are closed.

One of the biggest searches on mobiles is restaurants.

With the qr codes put 10 on a page and include other restaurants in the area so they will see you are going to see others. I think you know what I am saying.

In the end you will not sell everyone. It is a numbers game.

Also prepare before you go out as this will increase your conversions.

Quentin

Hey. Nice tips. Right on.

I purchased Quentin's WSO a month or so ago and have gotten pretty good at building these mobile sites. I just got a samsung Android phone yesterday (my first smart phone) and I am amazed at how bad most business sites look (and function) on a mobile device.

I want to get some free golf this season so here is my plan.

I printed 2 QR codes for each golf course that I want to play this season. The first QR code goes to THEIR current site, and the 2nd goes to the mobile site I made for them.

Next week I'm simply going to walk in and let them know that I found their website on my mobile phone and that I had a really hard time navigating it. Because of the fact I love their course, I will tell them I took some time to make them a site that is more user friendly for mobile visitors. I will then scan the first to show them their site, then scan the 2nd QR code to show mine.

There 30 golf courses in my county and I plan on hitting every one until I get someone to bite and barter free golf for the season in exchange for setting them up with a mobile site.

No guarantees, but I can't imagine this not working out to my hitting the links for free all season. That's the goal anyway.

Soon more people will access the Net with smartphones than PC's.

Google is not dropping QR Codes. They were trailing it on some Google places pages and decided it was not necessary.

Lets face it this was pretty lame because if you accessed a google places on your mobile why would you need a QR Code and if you accessed it on a desktop why would you need the code.

They are still the prime supplier using their charts software.

Quentin

As mentioned above to a degree... I would make a demo site that is fully operational to walk them through. Team this up with the facts... that are only going to get better for the purposes of a mobile site. Would be much easier for them to "get"!

My experience thus far going after restaurants has been awesome...If you can show value you can get a check...I make my calls to restaurants from 1pm-3pm I find the decision maker most of the time calling during that time...I simply say this 20 times a day between 1pm and 3pm and I get 1-2 10 min. meetings everytime...

"my name is Scott Herrera and I'm a local business owner, I saw your website this morning, but noticed you don't have a mobile website.

I would like to share with you how mobile marketing could enhance customer accessibility to your business and provide you with potentially hundreds of new and returning customers every month."

I will create a home page of your current site for you that is mobile ready all I ask is for a 10 minute meeting to share the value of mobile marketing."

Actually if you look at the era around 1992, it was hell getting people to sit at a computer, and then getting people to sign online was ten times worse. So we used to talk about how cool it was to share info to one degree or another and everyone else just kind of rolled their eyes "So I want to get online for what? To roll dice and play dungeon games with nerds?" which for me was so far from real I just thought "whatever" and watched the whole thing slowly develop into the global network era we are in now.

So, when it comes to "mobile" consider that the majority of people have NO interest in sitting at a desk - AT ALL. Also, the web is not a great importance to the majority of the market unless it gives them something of value, or that it "applies" to something they can DO or GET. That is why applications are key, they apply to something a visitor can DO or GET.

Now, the way to "pitch" is to use rhetoric or buzzwords; which I hate in a solid conversation - but find necessary in an "elevator speech". So application and sensors come to mind as far as tech terms go, and Audience Optimization is a slightly vague but cool umbrella for a ton of items you can get into. That is, it's more about the audience and less about search engines with mobile.

With mobile devices, you can have several sensors at a time being tracked and analyzed depending on what you are trying to get done. They can track how fast someone is going, what altitude, what the temperature was when someone purchased etc. And those are internal device sensors, that you can combine with external sensors (QR codes are an example of these).

If you can send out a killer coupon, at a certain time of day and only in a certain location and specific customer segments and return a result; that information is extremely valuable.

Long story short, if you are pitching a mobile web just so it fits on a devices tiny screen; its not going to be that big of a hook. If you can pitch a way to isolate and target the most profitable segment for a specific clients needs that is a KILLER hook. Find the applications the segment desires and wants, and you have a serious marketing tool for your client.

One example I tend to tell people is that we have several donut shops here in our town that also do cakes for events, and that is over half of their profit. If you can design a web site with their info that is alright, but if you can design a "cake designer" application that a customer can play with then send in an order from anywhere in the world - THAT IS KILLER!

Cost of design? Probably around $600 to $1000 in contractor costs and getting an app hosted (just a ballpark figure there). The value of getting that delivered to a client? Around $5000-$15000, not even including the marketing they would want to get into and advertising the thing (many apps are being developed at $250k and above). The "big guys" are already doing this, especially pizza stores - which is slightly more strained in that the final output (a pizza order) has to be delivered in around an hour.

So if you can find the "application" and the wants of the segment, figure that out and pitch it. As for getting a small customer a simple mobile site and not even getting into the application thing; I would mention that in order to even start getting into the value of mobile web, you have to start somewhere and begin testing what is and is not effective, and also bring up that it is very likely in the next five years that more than 80% of people will not even own a desktop computer anymore; worldwide this is already true as the global market is more and more online and speaking english so they can use the web on their smartphones - an on top of that, this is so powerful of an event just look at all the global political change sparked from online communications alone.

This all really reminds me of the internet market in the mid 90's. It was a constant, "why should I be online anyway?", then it turned into a "You have to be online, even if no one comes to your site, or regardless of if you understand it - it's just that way" kind of mentality. They may not fully get the tech behind being mobile, but they have to start somewhere.

Thanks for sharing answers. I was searching for this answers from many times and posted this thread in many forums but i was not able to find out the answers. I think now it will help me out in my problems.