Today your brand needs to be perpetually mobile because your customers are. Worldwide, there are more than 1 billion people with smartphones and tablets in hand looking to take action. Unfortunately, businesses don’t get to decide which device people use to access content. If you are not taking a mobile-first approach to your online presence, you are closing your door to potential customers.

Google’s recent survey of mobile users found the following:

• 96 percent said they encountered a website that was not mobile-friendly.
• 67 percent said that if the site were mobile- friendly, they would be more likely to purchase something.
• 48 percent said that even if they like a brand, a non-mobile-friendly site annoys them.

Let’s face it: Most companies are not on the cutting-edge of strategic mobile marketing. The good news is that everyone expects your company to have a website but not everyone expects you to have a mobile app or mobile-optimized website. Users are still in the forgiving mode, but in the next 12 months that will change.

Here are five starting points for developing your mobile strategy:

1. Know your audience. Go old-school and talk to your customers. What info do they look for on their mobile devices? What features are valuable, and what can they live without? If they could only do one thing on your mobile website, what would it be?

Observe your target audience. What devices are they using? Understanding this helps determine where you should focus your mobile strategy. Responsive design might address all devices, but not all businesses have the budget needed to incorporate this multi-device design process.

Dive into your analytics. Filter out your mobile traffic and see what sort of content mobile users are gleaning – or attempting to glean – from your site.

2. Know where you are today. Take a look at your online presence on several mobile devices. Ask yourself: Is the experience optimized across all devices?

Be your own customer – buy, contact, look up info – on various devices. How is it? Is it confusing? Is it hard to read on the smaller screen?

3. Know your competition. Review the online presence of your competitors. Do they have mobile-optimized messaging? Do they have apps? Can you buy their products or view services? Can your customers?

4. Know your goals. After understanding where you are and what your customers are looking for, the next step is to focus internally on your core business goal. Identifying this will help mold a mobile strategy to your goals rather than changing your business to fit into mobile.

5. Start now. Pick up a smartphone or iPad, and search for your brand. If you are like the majority, it will be a humbling experience. What you see is the baseline for how relevant you are right now.

Image via avinashkunnath.