You are not alone in feeling irritated by unsolicited calls or SMSs from direct sellers. Nearly two-thirds of respondents to a Maritz Research survey of Generation Y consumers say they are “unlikely” or “definitely unlikely” to subscribe to texted retail offers sent to their handsets.
The WebVisible-Nielsen survey is even gloomier, with 92% of the respondents saying that local business ads sent to their mobile phones irritate them. Similarly, four-fifths of mobile users in an Ingenio-sponsored survey conducted by Harris Interactive said that text messages sent to their handsets are totally unacceptable.
Yet far from feeling daunted, the industry projects that advertisers worldwide will spend $2.4 billion on mobile in 2009, up from $1 billion this year. One of the latest such projects come from Strategy Analytics, which expects a growing number of brands to insert ads into different mobile media, despite the continuing user resistance.