Beverage giant Starbucks is continuing to rely on mobile advertising as a vessel to drive engagement and in-store foot traffic.

The company is running a new mobile ad campaign within Pandora?s iPhone application that promotes its Refreshers beverages. The coffee giant has used mobile advertising quite a bit in the past to engage new and existing customers.

?Starbucks? new campaign ad for the new Refreshers beverage is visually appealing,? said Marci Troutman, CEO of SiteMinis. ?The click-through gives a little more insight on the green tea natural energy booster with an opportunity to share the ad.

?Overall the ad is informative through imagery and short messaging, another huge benefit for consumers to try the product that would help with the mobile ad campaign would be a coupon for purchase with an action link to a store locator to find the nearest location for purchase with the coupon,? she said.

?There is definitely a benefit in promoting a new product through mobile advertising.?

Ms. Troutman is not affiliated with Starbucks. She commented based on his expertise on the subject.

Starbucks did not respond to press inquiries.

Refreshingly new
Starbucks is running expandable mobile ads that promote its new Refreshers beverages and encourage consumers to re-energize now.

When users tap on the mobile ad, they are redirected  to the company?s mobile-optimized site where they can learn more about the products.

Ultimately, the mobile campaign aims to drive consumers to Starbucks locations to try out the beverages. Therefore, taking users to a landing page that educates them about the new product is a smart move.

Additionally, mobile advertising is the ideal channel for this campaign, because it helps reach a broad audience on Pandora?s platform.

Past efforts
Over the past years, Starbucks has been ramping up its mobile advertising efforts and continually turning to the medium to entice customers.

Earlier this year, the company ran a mobile advertising campaign that aimed to increase its VIA Instant Coffee sales (see story).

Most recently, Starbucks drove consumers to its locations to try out its bistro boxes via a new geotargeted mobile campaign (see story).

?The new Starbucks campaign is a little lacking in caffeine ? there is no call-to-action in terms of an offer and there is very little product information,? said Simon Buckingham, CEO of Appitalism.

?You don't even find out what the product is until the third screen as the product shots don't show any detail as to what the product is,? he said.

?This Starbucks campaign is more tiring than it is refreshing. This campaign won't re-energize until its reinvented.?

Final Take
Rimma Kats is associate editor on Mobile Marketer, New York