The UK has always seemed far ahead of the mobile curve than the US. The Jimmy Choo Foursquare Campaign, ShopStyle’s iPad app and Burberry’s Art of the Trench leaves marketers with the perception that UK fashion brands are head of  US fashion brands when it comes to marketing to customers via mobile devices.

Up until recently, many marketers have thought that UK was running closely behind Japan, China and Thailand. According to bigmouthmedia, the UK isn’t as far along as we thought.

bigmouthmedia, one of the UK’s leading search marketing agencies, has released a research study that more than three quarters of the UK’s big brands do not understand the value of a visitor via mobile compared to other digital channels.

The research, which polled the views of key decision makers at leading UK companies, shows that despite a significant 89.2% of respondents sharing the belief that mobile marketing will become increasingly important over the next 12 months, very few have fully embraced the channel. Reflecting the uncertainty with which many businesses regard the emerging the field, 70.3% of those surveyed currently don’t have any engagement with mobile marketing at all.

“We are at a critical point in the evolution of mobile marketing. A growing group of organizations are starting to derive competitive advantage from their early mover status in the channel, yet the vast majority of companies have yet to gauge the impact it is likely to have on their business,” said Simon Heyes, Head of International Sales Operations at Bigmouthmedia.

“There are no benefits to be derived from being slow on the uptake. With the mobile channel set to become increasingly influential over the next few years, companies need to move now, engage with the medium and start building the campaigns that are going to keep them ahead of the game.”

Despite an apparent lack of engagement with the channel the research revealed a keen awareness of the potential advantages, with 75.7% of respondents citing increased brand awareness as the main benefit of undertaking mobile marketing, and 67.6% believing increased customer engagement to also be a major benefit. Over 60% also believed that increased traffic, leads and sales were also a major driver.

Bigmouthmedia’s survey – conducted amongst a large group of large and medium sized enterprises – showed that just 5.4% companies describe themselves as being “heavily involved” in mobile marketing at the current time. Another statistic to emerge is that while they considered the channel increasingly influential, 75% of the respondents claimed not to know the relative value of a visitor from mobile compared to other channels.

“What is clear from our research is that while the vast majority of businesses accept that mobile is going to become a critical part of the marketing mix, there is a great deal of uncertainty over how to approach the channel, and in particular how to get buy in from the wider organization. Companies know they need to get on board the mobile bandwagon, but a lack of clear understanding is holding many back from exploiting its potential,” said Heyes.

Another recent forecast from Morgan Stanley found that at the rate its usage is accelerating, mobile internet use will overtake desktop internet use by 2015.

“In many ways the UK is behind many other markets when it comes to mobile adoption, with territories like Japan, the Philippines and Thailand already using mobile internet services much more than their European counterparts. In many organizations mobile has taken a back seat because the focus is still on mainstream digital strategy, but British companies can’t afford to make the same mistakes they did with the social media revolution, which commerce has only just got to grips with after three long years,” added Heyes.

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