Pet specialty retailer Petco has launched a mobile site and is in the midst of deciding on ways to drive consumers to the shopping destination through targeted mobile marketing channels.

A company executive said that mobile search and mobile advertising are in the mix of ideas that Petco is considering right now. However, the company has not decided on what tactics it will actually be using.

?The strategy behind the site is more about convenience [than driving additional sales revenue] and we wanted to give customers access to things like store locator and reviews in the format that best fits their needs,? said Katie Grisko, Web strategy manager at Petco, San Diego.  

?Why wouldn?t you go mobile with the increase in adoption of smartphones and mobile devices across the board,? she said. ?We want to be where customers are looking for us in an easily digestible format.?

Petco is a privately held specialty retailer that provides products, services and advice that make it easier for customers to be great pet parents. It operate more than 1,000 stores in 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Site details
The mobile site is meant to aid consumers while they are in-store and need more information on products, meaning less man power is needed for customer service at its locations nationwide.

The new mobile commerce-enabled site at http://www.m.petco.com is powered by Digby.

The site is specifically designed to make it easier for pet parents to stay connected and shop for their animal companions online and on-the-go.

The site offers convenient, 24-hour mobile access to thousands of leading pet products with easy-to-navigate browsing, rich product photographs, detailed product descriptions, customer reviews, full-site search capabilities and a store locator.

Pet lovers can navigate, research and purchase from Petco via the mobile Web when they visit http://www.petco.com on popular mobile devices including the iPhone/iPod touch, BlackBerry and Android.

No newbie to mobile
When the National Geographic Channel ran an SMS alert campaign promoting its "Dog Whisperer" program, which saw 2,000 opt-ins, Petco jumped on board as a sponsor.

The SMS alerts read "Sponsored by PETCO" and contained a mobile coupon code for 10 percent off purchases made at Petco.com (see story).

Mobile merchandising
In terms of merchandising on the mobile site, Ms. Grisko said that Petco is using the same strategy as its PC Web site.

Ms. Grisko said that Petco expects that as the site?s usage increases, the company will learn more about mobile users and will revamp the merchandising strategy based on the behavior it sees.

?We wanted to make sure we have a site and we wanted a store locator,? Ms. Grisko said.  ?There is a wealth of information we can give about a product which would be hard to message to a customer in-store.

?Stores can use less man power by providing this information on a mobile device and it allows customers to self-serve,? she said.