Investigating Mobile Inertia: A study of why mobile marketing in Sweden has not developed further

Abstract: Technological developments have enabled advertisers to expand their offerings from traditional channels such as print, television, billboards and radio to digital media. The mobile phone is a rapidly growing media and mobile marketing is projected a bright future. The unique features of the mobile phone such personalization, interactivity and ubiquity makes it attractive as a marketing channel. As for Sweden, one of the leading technological countries in the world, with a mobile penetration of 115 percent, still mobile marketing has not prospered and is seemingly slow to do so. During the first quarter of 2009 mobile advertising only added up to about 0.1 percent of total advertising spending in Sweden, the same share as the first quarter of 2008. The authors of this thesis find this phenomenon interesting as there seems to be a gap between the opportunities for mobile marketing and actual spending on the media channel. Thus, the overall purpose of this thesis is to explain why mobile marketing in Sweden has faced inertia and not developed further. The thesis is based on a theoretical framework consisting of a conceptual model with factors affecting the use of mobile marketing. In the thesis twelve distinct factors are identified as contributing to the inertia. Six of the factors are derived from the conceptual model and six of them are factors outside the model. Inter-factor relationships are established and how these affect the inertia is also described.