Would you rather leave home without your wallet or your phone? A global study discovered that a resounding 3 out of 4 of people would take their phone over their wallet. This makes sense – the idea of reaching into your pocket for one device to manage most aspects of your day makes it hard to consider leaving it behind. Whether it is consuming content, calling and texting, sending emails, playing games or watching videos, smartphones have become the singular touch point to manage life at virtually any place and/or time. It seems like smartphones are doing everything, except filling the shoes of the one thing that people would hypothetically leave behind – a wallet.

Despite our reliance on mobile devices, there aren’t many mobile shopping options that replace the function of traditional wallets. However, many brands are bringing more meaningful mobile opportunities to shoppers. Brands typically invest in mobile Mobicommerce experiences in three ways: in-store mobile transactions, apps and web extensions that assist shoppers in-store and online, and mobile advertising campaigns involving mobile shopping behaviors.

For brands integrating mobile into the retail shopping experience, transactional smartphone apps are bringing new efficiency to the in-store purchase process. Mobile solutions that showcase this marriage of mobile and purchase include, Starbucks’ mobile app, Square Wallet, Google Wallet and Passbook. In fact, Starbucks is a noted success. As of July 2013, mobile payments accounted for 10% of all Starbucks in-store purchases. Yet, despite this sparkling mobile victory by Starbucks, many brick and mortar retailers haven’t embrace mobile payment apps. A key issue is the lack of standardized retail infrastructure needed to support the mobile payment process. While Starbucks has equipped mobile scanning readers in all their stores for the acceptance of mobile payment, most retailers have not integrated such technology.

Besides facilitating in-store transactions, brands and agencies are also making strides in mobile commerce to engage consumers through optimized mobile WAP sites and apps. To draw consumers to direct shopping opportunities, brands are developing robust smartphone and tablet experiences that aid customers in making purchases more effectively virtually anywhere. The CVS/pharmacy app has taken on both tasks by enabling consumers to make purchases in-store and/or shop and manage prescriptions when away from retail spaces. The app provides more value by helping consumers find the nearest store, view weekly ads based on geography and engage with an assortment of pharmacy tools to refill or transfer prescriptions. Additionally, users can also find and attend CVS-sponsored health screening events. Engaging customers in-store, at home and on-the-go has helped CVS bring new value to their 69 million active loyalty card holders.

More brands are looking to create an ongoing dialogue with their customer base with these sticky executions that have mobile users regularly considering new purchase opportunities. Daily deals platform Groupon is actively capitalizing on the trend of mobile shopping behaviors with a shift from its email-based marketing program to a mobile app-based model. More than 50 million people have already downloaded it.

Brands that haven’t developed in-store transactional apps or high-functioning WAP sites for smartphones and tablets still have ample opportunities to connect with mobile audiences. Networks and ad buying platforms like Millennial, Mojiva, Flurry and AdTheorent can target smartphone and tablet users who are actively interested in purchasing in any particular shopping category. To better direct messages to those most likely to engage, mobile networks are mining data and creating relevant audience pools of in-market users. They further enrich engagement through interactive campaign-based landing pages, rich media units, and targeted messages based on user location. Strategically executed mobile ad campaigns paired with engaging creative units can assist in driving in-store foot traffic, enabling users to find nearby store locations and call retail associates, and view in-store offers, amongst a multitude of other purchase-focused actions.

While we shouldn’t leave home without our wallets, consumers know that their shopping experiences online and in-store are best paired with their mobile device in tow. Conscientious brands are capitalizing on this trend and investing in mobile tech and advertising to get customers closer to the point of purchase.

We live in a digital world. We communicate using digital technology, our ads are placed live with the click of a digital button and user data and interaction is monitored, aggregated and housed digitally. Yet when the clock strikes 5:00 pm, the digital media industry lets out a collective groan. Why don’t we have more time? In an industry that expects instantaneous results, how do we make the most of the time we have? Below are a few tips to keep you ahead of the game.

Spend time to save time
There is a fine line between a quick turnaround time and a loosely structured proposal. Even after a client briefing, questions will arise during the build process. For every question you ask, another question may be asked from your client to their director, and so on. To save yourself this game of telephone, prepare information that wasn’t necessarily asked for. For example, maybe include some offerings on the plan that weren’t originally asked for but make sense for this client.

Understand a client’s patterns. Do they generally run standard units or flashier takeovers and sponsorships? Have they valued branded content? Also, don’t overwhelm a single proposal with all of the bells and whistles, but understand your options if your client ends up building rich media units instead of static or sends a 30-second spot instead of :15. Understand the variables and understand your access to resources.

Two birds with one stone
Any time you send an e-mail, create a revision or process an order, think of what else you can do while you’re at it. Don’t be afraid to consolidate communication and/or communicate offline.

Meet with your team in person and pick up the phone to call your client. Conversation has an interesting way of reminding you of other things to ask. After a call, send a recap of the discussion. If you can afford the time to collect complete information and provide a single complete answer, you’ll save yourself from writing piecemealed information over the course of a day.

Stay ahead
Staying on the ball with your clients and brands has as much to do with understanding the people you’re working for as it has to do with the environment you’re working in. Learn what your brand is doing locally and nationally. Also, what are they doing cross-media?

Stay on top of the trends in the industry. Understand what is flashy and what delivers. Learn the offerings, find the case studies and prepare for the questions. Buzzwords only go so far in the industry, and your clients and partners will appreciate your honesty and knowledge if you’re a trusted source on the topic.

Understand limitations
Understand what your partners are good at and which clients or verticals they are the most suited for. Present a challenge with each campaign, but make sure you have a back-up plan in case limitations present themselves.

Don’t burn bridges in an effort to overcome a challenge. Your campaign will last this quarter, but your team and your partners are likely here to stay, or at least you hope they are. Manage these relationships accordingly.

Set expectations
Clients, team members and partners value honesty and transparency. If you’re unable to perform an execution or need a deadline extended, be honest and upfront. There is bound to be error in judgment and technology, so be prepared to have humble and/or frank conversations.

Behind every campaign and every email address is a person who operates on the same 24-hour day and is just as familiar with deadlines and expectations. So set expectations up front, and understand when the time, work and pride of your team are worth standing up for.

Additionally, for all of the time you spend on campaigns, allow yourself and your team a minute to reset. Nobody does their best work when burnt out. So take some time during a crazy week to go out for a walk, grab a coffee, meditate, etc.

What best practices do you have that help you through your digital day? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

Falling web ad prices sounds like good thing for advertisers, but the secret tax you may be paying is fewer actual impressions. We all know that CPC advertising can be exploited by bots, making it look like ads are getting click traffic when they’re actually not. CPM seemed to be the smarter way to pay: by impression, and not by click.

But now, like a sequel to a bad ‘80s movie, the bots are back. Those clever scammers are wreaking havoc on CPM and making it look like ads are being viewed when they aren’t. Behold, a few tricks of the ad-scam trade:

• Behind the curtain: An entire site is shrunk to a 1×1 pixel (the Internet equivalent to the head of a pin) and hidden onto a high traffic site featuring popular material like music lyrics or porn. It looks like your ad is being seen, but the viewer is really looking at … well, let’s not go there. Suffice it to say, in this case, size does matter.
• Tetris for scammers: The scammer is hiding, or “stacking” one ad behind another. In this case, the videos are all playing to completion, but the action is happening where the user can’t see it, often in inactive tabs.
• Flash in the scam: Ads run on accelerated schedules or in inactive tabs, so ad calls are refreshed more often than the user can process them.
• Now you see it, now you don’t: As many ads as possible are running out of view so you get charged for “view through attribution” on a closed loop success metric, but no real people view your ads.

No group is going to fess up to engaging in this kind of behavior, but fraud is rampant on lots of networks, DSPs and trading desks. It’s possible for this to happen without the knowledge of the perpetrator, so it’s important to choose your partners carefully and be sure you’re doing business with people who acknowledge click fraud and will be proactive about making sure it doesn’t happen to you.

Three simple ways to protect yourself from impression fraud: buy closed exchange, buy based on transparency, and buy from trusted vendors. The truth is, if you’re looking for bargain basement prices, you’re probably not getting much for your money — that’s the hidden tax you pay when you buy dirt-cheap. A better way is to spend your ad dollars on a vendor you trust, who won’t give you convoluted explanations and complex excuses. Remember to trust your gut. If things don’t sound right to you, they’re probably not. My rule of thumb is, if technology can’t be explained simply, it should be questioned.

(This post was re-published from Ad Spandex. You can view the original post here - http://adspandex.com/articles/the-hidden-ad-tax/.)