Mobile marketing has become a flexible method for brands such as Delta Airlines, American Airlines, Jaguar and Wachovia and even the Arkansas Department of Parks to quickly jump in and out of campaigns. Paramount and VH1 have run campaigns as short as a weekend. Yahoo Mobile has supported more than two dozen brands in the last quarter.

Collaborating with Yahoo's mobile advertising team in November, Jaguar targeted males ages 35 to 54 with household incomes of more than $150,000 annually. The campaign, timed to coincide with the Los Angeles auto show, aimed to prove that mobile ads could reach a variety of consumers, and not just teens who carry tech-savvy smartphones like Apple's iPhone, Nokia's N95 and Research In Motion's (RIM) BlackBerry.

Jaguar reached out to high-income consumers by purchasing targeted banners across Yahoo mobile Web sites that, according to M:Metrics, reach more than 20 million unique users monthly. The company also bought a front-page roadblock announcing the XF sedan at the L.A. Auto Show.

Timing mobile advertising campaigns to coincide with product releases or major events can create maximum exposure for brands. Not only did the ad result in nearly 7 million impressions, but Jaguar saw a high level of users engage with the brand. The strategy built "significant" pre-release interest among its key audience, according to Michael Bayle, senior director, monetization, Connected Life, Yahoo.

Building a strong carrier network during the past 18 months has helped. "We represent all inventory for AT&T for search and some for display," Bayle says. "In the U.K. we represent inventory for Vodafone and T-Mobile."

For Jaguar, targeted ads on Yahoo Mobile generated 82,000 clicks, driving traffic to the Jaguar mobile site. The campaign also prompted a 96% completion rate of the dealer location form; nearly 1,500 e-mails were collected on the Jaguar mobile site; and consumers downloaded more than 11,000 video of the XF sedan.

Bayle says Jaguar also took the same mobile marketing campaign to deploy on Microsoft's sites. "We are a strong believer that all boats rise, even in a nascent market," he says.

Mobile marketing is a direct and more personal approach, which fits nicely with Jaguar's customer-centric image to speak directly to consumers, according to Chris Cedergren, managing partner at research firm Iceology, who admits he's the perfect target for mobile ads with two Mercedes and one Audi parked in the garage of his Los Angeles home. "There is so much media clutter and it's difficult to find one media source to capture someone's attention, especially the affluent clientele," he says. "If you're trying to deal with the pressure to be green, you don't want direct mail pieces."

Hoping to further capitalize on its target audience's use of mobile devices, Jaguar earlier this year teamed up with Yahoo for exclusive sponsored ads on Yahoo mobile's NCAA Men's Tournament site. Jaguar is sponsoring text-message alerts with NCAA sports news.

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