April » 2009 » mobilegroove

Between Mobile Advertising U.K and research and interviews I am conducting for MSG's own MobiAD World Focus project, I am sharply focused on finding answers to the "big questions" in mobile advertising. The obvious question (Where is the money?) came up during last week's European Mobile Media Conference in Prague. It's not an easy one to answer, but Jonathan MacDonald, an esteemed colleague who also has a long track record in advising companies on their mobile strategies, was up to the challenge. He turned the question around and showed in his presentation that the money is where it always was: With people we are best advised to stop treating as consumers. (You can view Jonathan's slide deck along with a few others here, thanks to Jan Rezab from HungryMobile.) So, how do we get our share of the money out there? Jonathan suggests companies position themselves closer to people and respect their requirement (particularly in the mobile space) for conversation - both with the brand and with their peers. In a nutshell: "Abandon control of communications and realize that advocacy is more powerful than you. Provide facilities and utilities for people to talk with each other and listen [to what they say]. The next step is about creating and co-creating experiences, products, and services that people value. Get that right and the way is clear to pursue a strategy that will ensure you get your share of the money. I won't give it all away here (and perhaps you'll have to attend Jonathan's upcoming mobile advertising workshop), but let's just say a big part of it is "creating things that are open, customizable, extensible, and share-able." Before you dismiss this as a warm-and-fuzzy approach, I recommend you read The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers, a must-read business book co-authored by C. K. Prahalad that has had a profound impact on my work. In this recent interview he further outlines how the role of the consumer (the individual!) has changed. "Traditionally, companies create products based on their market research and exchange that for a value. But it has changed now, with customers equally involved in solving the problem. Co-creation is not customization, but it is personalized." Prahalad doesn't specifically address mobile - an extremely personal device central to our lives - but it's easy to make a logical leap and conclude that people are likely to be more demanding of a say in personalizing a personal experience like receiving personalized content/advertising on a personal device. My point: Mobile is personal and mobile advertising (actually all communications from all companies) will have to at least offer people a say in their experiences. If they choose to be passive "consumers" then we have to let them make that choice themselves (as opposed to us making it for them). This brings me to the presentation from Mark Linder, Global Client Leader at WPP, a global advertising and communications agency. Mark focused on the other "big question" in the industry: What will have to happen for mobile advertising to really take off? He gave us a choice: 1) Mobile advertising will have to prove its effectiveness to the advertiser, and utility to the consumer or 2) Mobile advertising will have to prove its emotionality as an experience. Which do YOU choose?

Back as promised with an exclusive podcast to connect the dots in the recent raft of announcements and get the inside track on Scanbuy strategy. Indeed, there are a lot of open questions since Scanbuy, a leader in mobile marketing solutions based on barcodes, surprised the industry in early April with the decision to make the specs for the company's proprietary EZcode 2D barcode symbology "globally available." What does this really mean and what structures will Scanbuy put in place to see this through? These are just a few of the questions I explore with Jonathan Bulkeley, Scanbuy CEO. (Personal thanks to David Javitch, Scanbuy VP of Marketing, for streamlining my request and arranging the podcast, the first such in-depth interview since the announcement.) To fully understand the significance of Scanbuy's decision, it's important to review the events and announcements that have effectively dealt companies up and down the mobile barcode business ecosystem (Scanbuy included) a new hand of cards. First came the decision in February by the United States Patent and Trademark Office to re-examine the patent claims filed by NeoMedia Technologies, a provider of barcode scanning solutions. The move prompted NeoMedia to push forward in March on a patent licensing program and tie up with other vendors (3GVision, Mobile Discovery, Mobile Tag, and NeuStar) in a pilot program based on open standards in a bid to show interoperability between the technologies out there and - more importantly - position NeuStar, a short code registry, as a central clearinghouse in the middle. More about this model and Jonathan's own take in the podcast.

Where is the money in mobile advertising? Or more specifically: Where is MY money? At European Mobile Media, a conference I chaired in Prague (congratulations to Mart Kikas, Business Development, CEE/CIS,Aspiro and Jan Rezab, CEO HungryMobile, for bringing together a quality cross-section of the mobile ecosystem to talk business, best practice and - most importantly - ask uncomfortable questions!), this was the question. No surprise since we talk a lot about all the money to be made in mobile advertising - a discussion fuelled by over-hyped analyst forecasts, and excitement over a handful of super-cool mobile campaigns. But rather than ignore general discontent, Jonathan MacDonald (speaking with his Jonathan MacDonald Associates hat on) responded by changing his presentation on the fly, treating us to an insightful look at where the money is and how we can all get our share. Predictably, the presentation struck an important chord. (Jonathan and I cross paths on many podiums, and his presentations - which consistently force us to think outside the box - are always a highlight for me.) The focus on the money during the conference brings me back to RingRing Media Ltd., an independent media agency headquartered in the U.K. whose client list and ad spending on their behalf (booking over $4.5 million in 8 months) is clear confirmation that mobile advertising is gathering traction among brands and content companies. Put another way, the ecosystem is taking shape and companies are taking their share. Indeed, RingRing posted a particularly strong March, serving over 350 million ads and spending GBP350,000 on mobile Web advertising alone. Excited by the stats and anxious to learn more about this company that is coming up to its first anniversary (formally founded and Angel funded to the tune of GBP300,000 May 2008), I caught up with Ben Tatton-Brown, RingRing Co-Founder & Managing Director, to dig into the numbers, delve into the details of the company's new release ad-optimizer platform, and discuss where the money really is. (Thanks again to Tim Banks at infomob public relations for his prompt response in setting up the briefing!) What do clients spend? What are the CTRs? And what are the options for publishers? Ben's answers may surprise you.

Regular readers will know I rave about EContent magazine, where I am a Contributing Editor and regular columnist. I am proud to say some of my best work has been for EContent, inspired by the vision and dedication of Michelle Manafy, EContent editor-in-chief and expert commentator on a range of issues impacting the content industry at all levels. I encourage you to add the site to your list of must-read destinations. Why? Many of the business models and businesses driving revenues in the Internet are coming soon to mobile. (Search engines and collaborative software companies lead the pack of companies moving out of stealth mode to make some serious waves.) Amidst this change I know of no better source than EContent to stay that extra-important step ahead of the game. (I will therefore give EContent a top-notch spot in the new-look Knowledge Sharing Zone I wrote about in this earlier post. The goal is to create a comprehensive list of valuable resources and destinations. If you would like your site or blog to be considered, please email it to me (peggy@msearchgroove.com). As part of the recent Buying and Selling eContent conference, Michelle invited experts and contributors who judged the EContent 100, to give their views on the companies and trends that matter. Michelle reports that the series of video interviews got good reviews, and the content in them was "extremely well received."

Taking a short break from my research projects and excellent line-up of C-Level briefings/interviews to speak on mobile search and content discovery at the 3rd European Mobile Media Conference this week in Prague (April 22-23). I'm particularly excited about the line-up of high-caliber interviews/podcasts at MSG this week, and will list these regularly in the text box located in the MSG header at the top of the homepage. The European Mobile Media Conference is a great way to connect with professionals and practitioners having a profound impact on the mobile industry across Eastern Europe, and I particularly look forward to briefings and meet-ups with mobile executives from the Baltic region, for example. And now there is even more reason to attend: The organizers have extended a special last-minute discount. You can attend the two-day conference for just €300, if you register using the code HMR30. Thanks to Jan Rezab, CEO of HungryMobile, a mobile industry consultancy and European Mobile Media Conference media sponsor, for bringing this offer to my attention. It's a great deal and I encourage MSG readers to register. If you plan to be

Between the Mobile Advertising U.K. research project and interviews for MSG's own global mobile advertising reference work (more about that in future posts), I'm naturally eager to connect with the companies and the brands that set the bar. (If you have a story you would like me to consider for the projects I mentioned, or you just want to share your news with the growing MSG community of mobile operators, influencers, senior executives, and decision-makers, I encourage you to contact me directly or email my PA Andrea Henninge to set up a briefing (andrea@msearchgroove.com). A company that has caught my attention, with a potentially path-breaking approach to location-based advertising, is BipBip, the brainchild of Lasse Larsen, Chairman of the Board, WIS International. (Wireless Information Services). The company - headquartered in Riga, Latvia - has an impressive stockpile of patents around the service, and ambitious plans to launch BipBip worldwide (including the U.S., China, India and 21 cities across Europe) following a successful pilot in Denmark last month. (My personal thanks to Lasse for contacting me on Twitter (@peggyanne) and for giving MSG the exclusive.) What is BipBip? On paper the ad-funded service fulfills the criteria mobile advertising evangelists Andrew Grill and Jonathan MacDonald would no doubt agree are essential to delivering effective advertising services. I'm thinking here of the 3Ps: Permission (people will decide what brand messages they interact with); Privacy (people will decide where their data is collected and how it is used); and Preference (people will decide what content they find relevant). But the real differentiator is an even cleverer feature that turns greed-is-good bargain hunting into a mission to make the world a better place.