It was refreshing to hear an advertising executive (other than Jonathan MacDonald and, more recently, WPP’s Mark Linder) provide reasons why the individual(!) sits at the center of a newly- emerging (and ever-evolving) mobile advertising value web. But now we have proof that what many suggest is idealism, can actually provide the basis for an ideal business model.

The news is today’s announcement by Reebok that it has launched Your Reebok, the world’s first iPhone app that allows us to customize our sneakers (an app created by Inside Mobile). Your Reebok launches initially in the U.S. and the U.K. but the service will go live in Germany, France, Belgium, Holland, Austria, and Ireland in the coming months. But the real news for me is the sea change in mobile advertising/marketing thinking this made-for-mobile app represents. I caught up with Dusan Hamlin, Inside Mobile Managing Director, to talk about what the app does now, and what we can expect next.

At first glance, the cool factor is how this app uses the features and functionality of the iPhone, such as the accelerometer, to take mobile interaction to another level. In addition to being able to customize up to 23 areas of the show with a choice of 19 colors, people can also shake the iPhone to mix and meld colors in truly one-of-a-kind random designs.

Do you like what you see? Then share it with a friend. But this time we’re not talking about just another app that lets us show stuff to people in a one-way (one-to-several broadcast) exchange. Dusan made a conscious choice to enable mobile community collaboration. “You share the sneaker with friends and say ‘what do you think?’ They edit it [your design], make some changes and send it back, saying ‘it was cool before, but I like it more now.’” (Yes, another example that plays in favor of the much larger – and I would argue – inevitable trend to co-creation. I am immediately reminded of the work of Eric von Hippel, Professor and Head of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Group at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Democratizing Innovation, his must-read business book published in 2005, strikes a new chord when we apply it to mobile.

Beyond collaboration, the app lets us tag our design, add it to a Google map, and view all the other tagged designs worldwide.

Location awareness is an element in the service, and plays a significant role in the service roadmap, but Dusan’s plans are light years ahead of the stale location-based advertising approaches I hear at conferences and industry get-togethers. Dusan has developed a strategy that turns location into a core element of a much larger (and vastly more exciting) personal creativity app. Location-based inspiration is the buzzword here. In a future version of the app, the service will suggest ideas/motifs to people (to help them customize their sneakers) based around their location and time of day. “If it’s 2am and you’re in London, the app will show you designs that fit with nightclubs, clubbing, and the mood of that moment.” Likewise, switching the app on when you’re on a beach in the middle of the afternoon might deliver designs based around muted natural colors, cloud shapes, and holiday fun.

But Reebok doesn’t only boost brand awareness. It offers people a chance to buy the shoes they customize. For the moment, that’s the only aspect of the service that is online (as opposed to mobile). In practical terms, people (when they have completed customizing their sneakers) have to click on an option to email the design to their PC, where they can complete the transaction. (No bill-shock here. The app tells you – as you design the sneaker and choose from materials such as suede and leather to complete the look – exactly how much the shoe will cost. The fully customized shoes range from GBP80 to GBP110, depending on the shoe, materials, and optional extras.)

Moving forward (and no doubt after successful negotiations with Apple – amazing how they have become a gatekeeper in mobile apps and commerce!),  a future version will let people buy the shoes using their mobile phone and credit card. It will be interesting to see what cut Apple takes for the transaction…

My take: Communication, creativity, collaboration, and commerce. Impressive! Connect the dots, as Dusan and I did, and it’s all about making long tail marketing possible. All the more effective since the process from end-to-end involves us, turning us into proud creators, brand ambassadors, and new recruits in the army of fanatics that brands like Reebok need to succeed. (Once again borrowing a disruptive concept from my favorite source: Jonathan MacDonald…)

So, does the Reebok app cover the bases to make the jump from social activity to social community? Yes, but Dusan is more interested in enabling a community than building one. “That part of the API will be open. So if people want to build a community around a design, or create a kind of work group to develop a design, it’s up to them. No one is in control here.” (And no one should be.)

My take: Inside Mobile’s goal was to create a new kind of brand sponsorship model and encourage empowered people to spend more time (on their terms) with the brand using their mobile phones. In my view, the company has succeeded on all counts.