The mobile banner ads are running within the AP News mobile site. The campaign points to a growing need from consumer-packaged-goods marketers to use mobile advertising to push in-store sales and loyalty.

“Now more than ever, consumers are using their mobile devices to help plan shopping lists, utilize product locators or research for product information and coupons at point of purchase,”said Jarod Ballentine, digital marketing manager for Silk, Broomfield, CO.

“When we launched Fruit&Protein in 2012, we knew mobile advertising would be an integral part of the marketing mix,” he said.

“The strategy was to place mobile ads around content that we knew our target was reading and make the product top of mind when searching for grocery-related content and shopping lists.”

Drink on mobile
The banner ads feature two pictures of Silk products with copy that reads, “Juice never looked so good.”

The ad also encourages consumers to tap on the ad to expand the creative.

The landing page for the ad is simple with pictures of three Silk products.

Underneath, a button prompts users to tap to find a location where the new products are available.

A click-through on the ad directs consumers to the ‘where to buy’ feature on the company’s mobile site.

From there, consumers can select the product from a drop-down menu of all silk products. Other filters such as flavor and size can also be picked by users to cut down on the number of search results.

The site finds nearby stores via a ZIP code that consumers can type into a box.

Via the search results page, consumers can view a list of all nearby stores, which includes click-to-call and click-to-map functions.

Another key feature on the site include a page for sign-ups of the brand’s email newsletter, which sends users monthly coupons.

Buttons to all of Silk’s major social media pages – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest and Instagram – are promoted at the top of the page.
About 30 percent of traffic to all Silk online channels is mobile, per Mr. Ballentine.

“In fact, as part of the relaunch of Silk.com earlier this year, a big focus was improving the mobile optimization and mobile user experience on the site, so we only expect the 30 percent to go up,” Mr. Ballentine said.

Promote on mobile
Silk is among many brands that are increasingly turning to mobile advertising to get the word out about small consumer-packaged-goods purchases.

Moreover, the location aspect is a great way for Silk to drive in-store trial.

For instance, frozen yogurt chain Pinkberry recently used location-based ads that were tied to a coupon to get consumers in-store to try a new frozen yogurt (see story).

Additionally, Subway consistently uses mobile advertising as part of bigger marketing efforts around new products and promotions. Most recently, the sandwich chain ran a mobile campaign to promote a line of Italian sandwiches (see story).

In this case, Silk could have tied the mobile ad to a coupon or another incentivize to drive click-throughs and sales of the products.

“Silk is best known for its soy milk and when a brand introduces a new product such as Silk Fruit & Protein, they need to raise awareness amongst consumers,” said Simon Buckingham, CEO of Appitalism, New York.

Mr. Buckingham is not associated with Silk. He commented based on his expertise on the subject.

“Mobile is one of the channels to reach large numbers of consumers relatively inexpensively,” he said.

Final Take
A Silk commercial for Fruit & Protein