The willingness of people to interact with brands on their mobile phones (and their growing reliance on mobile devices for shopping advice and assistance on the move) has jumpstarted a new phase in mobile marketing growth driven by retail brands and advertisers. From department stores to computers & electronics retailers to luxury fashion brands, marketers are investing in mobile advertising to reach and influence people throughout the purchase funnel (awareness, engagement,  consideration, conversion and loyalty). Mobile retail users. Of the 13 million, “over 6.5 MORE >>

And now there’s a new study out from YesMai l, which looked at the social networks of 20 popular clothing retailers in order to discover how email boosts social engagement, what times of day and week are most effective, and how to standardize some of your engagement in order to succeed. . It found a few interesting things: Marketers are deploying their Facebook campaigns the wrong time of day. According to the study, the Facebook campaigns of the brands it studied reached the highest level of interaction between 10 p.m. and 12 a.m. to 7 p.m. ET, even though 5 a.m. MORE >>

Mobile shopping app   Shopkick , which rewards shoppers for walking into stores and interacting with products, has added CVS/pharmacy as the first pharmacy to join its lineup of retail brands that already includes major names like  Macy’s, Target, American Eagle, Mobil, Best Buy and ToysRus. Launched in August 2010, Shopkick is now enabled at more than 7,000 partner retail locations across the U.S. The program kicks off with a special offer of $5 to shoppers who visit participating CVS locations with the Shopkick app. Mashable ). MORE >>

The retailer also “loved the idea of tying their brand to something as tangible and emotional as a card sent to a loved one in the mail.” ” Social Media Campaigns Gap holiday promotion mobile app Postagram retail SincerelyLast week the Gap announced a social media promotion for the holidays: the brand’s Facebook fans can send their own photos as real, printed postcards to their Facebook friends – for free. The cards usually cost $0.99 each, but Gap is giving away up to 1 million free postcards through the end of the holidays. MORE >>

SIGMA has helped clients deploy hundreds of email campaigns, including demand generation, lead nurture and loyalty programs. As expected, the performance of email campaigns ranges significantly. One test we have tried across many different types of campaigns that has consistently improved response is to create multiple email waves. We have seen campaign gains of over two times—for opens and responses—when three email waves—vs. To be cost-effective, consider the creation of a multiple wave campaign upfront – rather than after your first wave underperforms. MORE >>