Surprise at DM Days show: Many didn't know how to text – Mobile Marketer – Associations

Surprise at DM Days show: Many didn’t know how to text – Mobile Marketer – Associations.

Let me preface what I’m about to say by confessing that my career began in direct marketing, and in many ways, still lives and grows there.  I love DM.

That said, I’m 100% NOT SURPRISED that the crowd at a DMA event did not know about how to text.  The DMA has been lagging in for years, its members frequently ages behind in technology.  The DMA membership has always been more focused on snail-mail, email, and has pretty much caught onto SEM in recent years.

But it took a long time for them to embrace the web, so the fact that they’re behind the curve on mobile isn’t at all shocking.  From one exhibitor:

It was amazing to us how many people didn’t know what a short code or keyword is, and how many people couldn’t send a text message. With their smartphones they could text, but only to people in their address book. It was a challenge to be able to enter a short code. We need a lot more education.

By all accounts, show traffic was light this year. And a new “mobile pavillion” area only housed four exhibitors.