Smartphones now account for one out of every seven phones, and Nielsen says that Blackberry gained the most smartphone market share during the period, up five points to 19 percent. Nokia’s woes continued, with its share of the total UK market down 7 percent to 44 percent. Source

The bottom line: If only 20 percent of UK mobile users are getting online with their phones, there’s still a lot of growth left in that market for content providers and mobile marketers.

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ONE IN SIX HANDSETS WILL HAVE NFC FUNCTIONALITY BY 2014, according to Juniper Research, as use spreads outside of Japan. The company says that in five years, the value of transactions processed over NFC worldwide will exceed $110 billion, with mobile payments and retail applications (such as coupons) the most widely used applications, though ticketing (such as for public transport) will also play a roll in pushing the rollout. Source

The bottom line: It seems like we’ve been waiting on NFC for a long time, and in the west, it’s never moved much past the trial stage and isn’t readily available in handsets. That’s one problem, but another is the cost of POS equipment for retailers, who won’t want to shell out for readers and other gear unless there’s really something valuable in it for them.

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CONSUMERS WHO RESPOND TO MOBILE MARKETING ARE MORE AVID USERS OF SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES, says a new report from BIGresearch, and tend to be young men, the company says. It also adds that since its last study of US consumers in 2008, the percentage of people who don’t like to get SMS ads (66.8 percent), as well as the percentage of people who believe marketers need permission before sending mobile ads (58 percent), have increased. Source

The bottom line: With two-thirds of people saying they don’t like text ads, and almost 60 percent saying there needs to be opt-in, one message is clear: sending out blanket text ads (especially without permission) isn’t an effective use of mobile marketing.

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DESPITE THE MOBILE’S CONNECTION TO USER-GENERATED CONTENT, people prefer to watch professional video content on their handsets, according to research from Real Networks. It says that while YouTube is the most popular UGC video site on mobile, it’s eclipsed by content from pros (at least in the US), such as NBC, Fox, The Weather Channel, MTV, Comedy Central and ESPN.(Source: a Real Networks “mini-bulletin email)

The bottom line: One possible explanation for this is that users on mobile are task-focused: that is, they want to see what the weather is going to be, or they want to see a certain sports clip, and the professional content is better for that than something like YouTube. Also, the browsing and finding experience of the professionally curated content may be simpler than with many UGC sites on mobile. Or, it could simply be that many of these professional channels are accessed through a carrier portal, so they’re more prominent to users, or may work more reliably than some UGC sites.

That said, the ranking of ad networks according to potential monthly visitors is:

1. Millennial Media: 45.6 million
2. Third Screen Media: 28.6 million
3. AdMob: 25.7 million
4. MSN Ad Network: 25.4 million
5. Jumptap: 23.4 million
6. Quattro Wireless: 23 million
Source

The bottom line: Nielsen’s warning makes it hard to put a lot of faith in these numbers, but as the company itself pointed out, overall, they illustrate the reach mobile ad networks can now offer, alongside all of their other benefits like effective targeting. So, in some way, having the biggest reach isn’t as important as having the right reach – that is, targeting the correct audience – for each advertiser.
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ADMOB TO SERVE UP ITS 100 BILLIONTH AD sometime over the weekend, the company said in an email. It’s certainly a big number, reached in three years or so, and the company says it’s now serving more than 8 billion impressions per month across its network. Source

The bottom line: Admob continues to grow its number of impressions, but as the above point indicates, it’s not all about quantity. Establishing significant inventory is important, but going forward, that won’t be an issue, as the previous point shows. Effective targeting and other enhancements will be key to unlock the real potential of mobile advertising.
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MARKETERS ARE STILL SKEPTICAL ABOUT TWITTER, with just 8 percent saying they think it’s a “very effective” promotional tool, while 50 percent say it’s “somewhat effective”. Consumers feel the same way, with half of them saying it’s “not that effective” or “not at all effective” for promotions. Source

The bottom line: These numbers are striking, given all the hype surrounding Twitter at the moment. But instead of undermining social media’s value to marketers, perhaps they reflect an understanding that social networks really don’t work as outlets for traditional advertising and promotional efforts, and that successful social media marketing requires a different approach. It seems clear that consumers don’t want their social networks polluted with impersonal advertising blasted at them from marketers, so a different, more conversational and personal – and less overtly promotional – approach is needed.
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MONTHLY DATA TRAFFIC WILL EXCEED 2008′S YEARLY TOTAL WITHIN 5 YEARS, according to a new report from ABI Research. The company says that in 2008, 1.3 exabytes of data went across mobile networks, but in 2014, 1.6 exabytes will be sent each month. The vast majority of this – 74 percent – will be from web and internet access, with more than half of all traffic coming from computers with embedded cellular modems.

ABI says that a quarter of the 2014 traffic will be from audio and video streaming, with less than 1 percent from VoIP and P2P file-sharing. Those last two segments seem a bit low, particularly if consumers shift in large numbers from fixed to mobile internet for their primary broadband connection. It’s unrealistic to think that consumers will give up their P2P and VoIP apps when they go mobile on a PC, regardless of the blocking operators may try to do. Source

The bottom line: Mobile data traffic will obviously continue to boom – but much of the growth will come from PC and laptop use. While mobile operators will welcome the revenue bump, the question remains if their networks can handle all the activity without sacrificing performance.
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WESTERN EUROPE’S MOBILE AD MARKET TO BE WORTH €950 MILLION BY 2013, according to new research from FirstPartner. The company says that the market will see a compound annual growth rate of 50 percent over the next five years, with the U.K. leading the way. It also adds that mobile search will be the most dominant revenue stream, and that if the mobile ad market is going to really take off, the ecosystem of operators, ad agencies and sales houses will have to work closely to sell the market on mobile advertising’s benefits. Source

The bottom line: Predicating a market growth report on operators playing ball with anyone could be a risky proposition – but that’s not to say the company’s incorrect in saying the ecosystem has to align itself and work together to move in the right direction.
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TURKEY TO HAVE 30 MILLION 3G USERS BY 2013, according to Wireless Intelligence. The country’s mobile operators flipped on their 3G networks last week, and the research firm expects them to see solid growth. While Turkey may be late to the 3G game, there’s high demand for high-speed mobile data, while the infrastructure and device market has also matured, allowing for heavy growth. Source

The bottom line: Not a lot to say about this one, really, apart from the idea that high-speed data and access to mobile content and data services is a global phenomenon at this point. That said, content providers and marketers still need to work to build their local intelligence, because while the generic global demand might be there, what works and what doesn’t will vary from area to area.

The 450+ attendees at Think Mobile that descended on NYC in March can count themselves lucky. We were treated to an excellent line-up of 60+ top-notch speakers, chosen by my esteemed colleague Matthew Snyder, Founder & CEO of ADObjects, a strategic cross-media consultancy, for their insights, ideas, and willingness to share both. Feedback from my panel on Mobile Search & SEO has been overwhelmingly positive, in part because Matthew and I brainstormed and purposely brought together an eclectic mix of individuals passionate about their work and the mobile industry at large.

I was so impressed by the caliber of speakers (Michael Slinger, Manager, Google: Rachel Pasqua, Director, Mobile Strategy, iCrossing; and David Berkowitz, Director of Emerging Media & Client Strategy at 360i) that I have decided to showcase each individually on MSG. (I had the opportunity to do a video interview with David and will be back with more on that, and his views on social media and mobile search, once the bnetTV team has edited the footage and posted in the video player in the sidebar.)

Today I kick off this “mini-series” with Bob Rosenschein, Answers Corporation CEO and mobile search “guru” (my description- he’s far too modest). The company’s social search service WikiAnswers.com has seen some stellar growth, according to comScore. In March, the measurement and market research firm reported that WikiAnswers.com U.S. unique visitors reached nearly 19 million in January 2009, compared to 729,000 in December 2006. During this time period, WikiAnswers.com’s market share increased from 4 percent to nearly 35 percent, vs. Yahoo! Answers, based on U.S. unique visitors. Overall, WikiAnswers.com was identified as the fastest growing top 200 U.S. domain for all of 2008.

Another milestone: Answers Corporation counted 10 million questions in the WikiAnswers.com Q&A database. (Answers Corporation acquired the WikiAnswers.com database in 2006, and since then questions have increased over 35-fold.) As Bruce D. Smith, Chief Strategic Officer of Answers Corporation, who leads the Community Development team, put it in a recent release: The WikiAnswers community is “experiencing exciting growth,” with over 500 volunteer supervisors and millions of contributors, supported by our 12-member Community Development Team.

Social search meets mobile? Regular readers will know I am excited about this combination. (In fact, I commented on this emerging business model in recent-release white papers from mobile search companies Taptu and abphone.) In view of WikiAnswers.com’s increasing popularity, I decided to take a closer look at the company’s future roadmap. I caught up with Bob to get the inside track on his company’s mobile ambitions, discuss the key criteria for an optimal mobile search experience, and the role of mobile advertising in the scheme of things.

Listen to the podcast. [16:18]

By way of background, Answers Corporation, founded in 1998, was formerly known as GuruNet. It changed its name to Answers Corporation in 2005. The company is best known as the owner of the popular social knowledge Q&A site WikiAnswers.com, and the “encyclodictionalmanacapedia” Answers.com. Answers is a Google AdSense partner, meaning thatAnswers.com and WikiAnswers.com show Google performance ads on their pages.

WIKIANSWERS.COM: It’s a fast-mover. “On WikiAnswers, people type in the questions; other people answer them; and hopefully, over time, we get the best possible answers. Our goal is to give the best answers anywhere on the Web, for any kind of question.”

MOBILE SEARCH: Bob can’t give specifics and I respect that. But he can give us an indication of what is in the pipeline. As he put it: “I will say that the area of delivering our answers on mobile is obviously of enormous interest to us this year and next year.” While companies can tailor their services to specific platforms and devices, Bob doesn’t recommend it and hints that his company is focused on “adapting our product lines over time to work on all of the mobile devices, and of course we mean smartphones, but not only smartphones — anything with a Web browser.”

OPTIMAL USER EXPERIENCE: Quick answers in fewer clicks is the algorithm for mobile search success. “We believe that there’s too much information overload.” The problem is that search engines are really good at searching the Web, but what do they deliver? “A page of links; of links to other sites, but you know what? The mobile world still has slow browsers….If you get a list of links to pages that are mobile pages, you’re almost afraid to click on one of them. How do you know if it’s going to be a 5 second page or a 25 second page?” You don’t know. “Our goal is to give people useful information in fewer clicks. And so that’s actually a very good hint towards how we see the mobile world evolving and what we think we might be able to add to it.”

MOBILE SEO: Is the end-game about delivering answers on the go? If so, then what is the potential impact on SEO? In a word: Profound. Bob points out that Google’s introduction of a canonical element aimed at assisting SEO clearly recognizes mobile content is different from the Web. “In other words, you can now make a page that exists in different forms, give it a canonical name, and tell Google that this is the canonical page. This is the real page, and all these other things are just adaptations of it for different user experiences and phone factors, especially mobile. So, Google is being advised that this is the same page as another page in a legitimate fashion such that it doesn’t hurt SEO.

PUBLISHER TIPS: Brand is everything, which is why companies must deliver a quality user experience that begins with the basics, such as presentation. “Users will have even less patience on a small device. You have to get it right and it’s a really different ballgame in terms of presentational dynamics.” Google and Yahoo will continue to be important, and I think the challenges for the rest of us [will be] to find our place in this new world…. [It] will boil down to user experience. In the words of Tim O’Reilly; ‘How do we get users to visit our content in an age where they are free to choose content?’

MONETIZATION & MOBILE ADS: Google changed the rules when it introduced text ads on their pages that didn’t look like text ads. “Google zagged when everybody else was zigging, and they did something very brilliant.” But the real lesson we must apply to mobile is relevancy.  ”It is attractive to the user; it’s more trustworthy. But if that weren’t enough, it is informative and not interruptive.” But even relevant ads might not convince users to accept mobile advertising, according to recent research from Nielsen Mobile (via Citi Investment Research, a division of Citigroup Global markets). Bob was kind enough to share a short excerpt and some surprising stats from the client report, written by analyst Mark Mahaney. Under the heading: “There is a material consumer resistance to mobile advertising,” Mahaney states privacy concerns and users’ skepticism are holding back mobile advertising in the U.S.

Meanwhile, we learn from the Thanh Nien Daily that mobile advertising is booming in Vietnam. Quoting Aaron Cross, managing director of The Nielsen Company in Vietnam, who spoke at a two-day conference on Integrated Marketing in Vietnam which wrapped up last Friday in Ho Chi Minh City, the post reports (according to the Nielsen Mobile Insights Survey 2008) almost half of mobile owners in Vietnam receive advertisements via SMS each month.

The majority of those ads are read by consumers. The survey also said 74 percent of people in HCMC and Hanoi, the country’s two economic hubs, own a mobile phone. Over half (58 percent) of the country’s urban population, and a third (37 percent) of rural residents own cell phones. But the way isn’t clear for mass marketing yet. Cross pointed out the new anti-spam government decree, which took effect last month in Vietnam, protects consumers from receiving unwanted messages on their mobile phones. However, cost-conscious Vietnamese consumers are open to “hot deals and great value to relieve pressure from their monthly budgets.”

Mobile advertising is also gaining traction in Japan. This post, quoting Tom Bowman, BBC.com’s VP international ad sales who spoke at the Digital Symposium hosted by Habari Media last week in the Western Cape, argues consumers are “almost twice as receptive to mobile advertising as to magazine advertising, making it the highest priority for prospective advertisers.”

WHAT’S NEXT?: The industry has to sort out business models. Is it sponsorship? Is it an animated display ad? Or is it some kind of click-through only on performance ads? “But I’m going to say something very flippant now: “Who cares? …It’s a branding opportunity… and sometimes you subsidize one part of your business with another.” Bob would rather “get the service right and figure out how to monetize later.”

Special thanks to Alison Minaglia at Technology PR for the image of Bob addressing the ThinkMobile audience!

These are just some of the key questions that came up during interviews with ad network executives at Mobile World Congress (MWC), and in a string of recent phone briefings. It’s also a line of questioning I hope to pursue at ThinkMobile, and Meet the Mobile Ad Networks, a panel led by Steve Smith with guest speakers Steven Rosenblatt, VP of Advertising Sales, Quattro Wireless; Eric Eller, Senior Vice President, Client Solutions, Millennial Media;  Patricia Clark, Regional VP of Sales, 4INFO; Paran Johar, CMO, JumpTap; Brian Murphy, Eastern Regional Sales Director, AdMob; and Robert Walczak, CEO & Founder, Ringleader Digital. It’s going to be a great session, and I’ll be back with my observations after the event.

BTW: Steve is a must-read columnist at MediaPost. Yesterday’s post, which recounts an experiment (a random click through mobile ads) and the user experience (disappointing and even frustrating), should be mandatory reading at ad agencies and networks everywhere. A key takeaway: “The system still is clogged with some crap even at branded media sites. Of course there are still dancing mortgage celebrants on CNN’s homepage, so we can’t fault mobile too much. But clicking on a mobile ad is an iffy thing. Mobile users don’t know yet what to expect, so if the publishing brand can ensure quality advertisers with quality end-user experiences, it elevates both the ads and the content.”

Steve’s column and my own observations lead me back to the key questions: How do the dedicated mobile ad networks fit in the game, and how will they differentiate? I caught up with Zaw Thet, CEO of 4INFO, the 800-pound gorilla of mobile messaging, and the company that Nielsen identified as the largest SMS content provider in North America for 4Q2008, to get the inside track on AdHaven (a new product 4INFO launched just prior to MWC that represents a rebranding of its entire suite of ad serving products) and where it fits into the roadmap.

By way of background, 4INFO’s strategy is about opening up its ad-serving technology to mobile operators and publishers to monetize their content with SMS text ads. The first step is AdHaven, a server that effectively provides publishers access to services including campaign management, ad sales and operations, and billing. Publishers can either sell their own ad inventory or go through 4INFO’s text ad network, which includes hundreds of premium publishers such as USA Today, Discovery Channel, MTV, E! Television Network, Evite, NBC, Maxim, ImpreMedia.

(I asked Zaw if 4INFO is on course for a head-on collision with JumpTap, which also sharpened its focus on premium content and launched a Premium Ad Network. His response: 4INFO has just launched with CBS and AOL, so there is some overlap in the strategy to focus on premium content. But there is no competition. “JumpTap is going after pure mobile Web traffic; we’re going after the traffic that is being created from SMS. It’s a fine distinction, but an important one.”)

The focus is on SMS (publishers can also choose from mobile ad formats such as click-to-call, click-to-video and click-to-the Web for text campaigns) but Zaw tells me “we’ll see AdHaven start to introduce other capabilities in the near future, where we’re [4INFO] not only serving ads in SMS, but we’re also helping publishers drive [traffic] from SMS content to WAP content, and then serve ads in those WAP content links as well.” To date the first commercial deployment of AdHaven is with VeriSign’s Messaging and Mobile Media division, a provider of SMS connectivity to more than 3 billion wireless subscribers, and its customers which include many leading corporate brands. Participating publishers can either sell their own ad inventory or participate in the 4INFO SMS Advertising Network.

My take: If we recall that 4INFO struck a trial mobile content and advertising deal with Yahoo last year, then it’s clear 4INFO is undergoing an exciting transformation that will ensure the company can compete with the major ad networks – if it decides to. But for the moment at least, the focus at 4INFO is on premium content and ways to deliver a consistent ad message across SMS and WAP content.

An excerpt from the Q&A:

Q: Let’s start with a high-level view of AdHaven and how it fits in.

A: The way that we really think about it [AdHaven] is it’s kind of like a Double-Click for SMS. But it does more than just SMS and I’ll get to that in a second. Previously, our ad-serving [offer] was only available if you were a publisher that used 4INFO connectivity. By that I mean,  in addition to your ad-serving solution, we were also your publishing platform that connected you to the carriers. Now, no matter where you are or the country you’re in, you can use AdHaven [for international reach] because 4INFO doesn’t currently support other carriers outside of the U.S. So that’s the big thing.

Q: What is the connection with VeriSign? They acquired a messaging company called m-Qube and I can imagine that they need a platform for their customers. Is there overlap or even competition?

A: For all of their [VeriSign] customers that don’t use the 4INFO platform and are using their [VeriSign's] aggregation tools, now all of those customers will have access to our ad-serving capabilities as well. We’re not in competition with the aggregators, so we’ll provide messaging when people want it, but we don’t ever see us getting into the aggregation business. VeriSign’s customers have certain sorts of enterprise requirements that, as part of the free public service from 4INFO, they may or may not receive. And so there’s always different levels of [service] that customers are looking to have. We have our own 4INFO traffic, but that’s a consumer-facing application. it’s not something that’s competitive to VeriSign’s enterprise messaging offering.

We don’t do interactive TV and voting and polling for large things like American Idol, because we’re just not set up to handle that as whereas VeriSign is. So now it means that those customers that have high bandwidth click-through requirements, with hundreds of millions of votes coming in, can now use these same sets of tools.

Q: So now you can go out to a company like SinglePoint, for example?

A: Yes, a company like that would be a customer for us.

Q: What else can you offer now that you have taken the wraps of AdHaven? Is it just about SMS?

A: You’ll see AdHaven start to actually introduce other capabilities in the near future where we’re not only serving ads in SMS, but  also helping publishers drive from SMS content to WAP content and then serve ads in those WAP content links as well.

Q: That’s where the ad networks are. Are you competing with them?

A: We’re not trying to be competitive with AdMob or Quattro or any of those guys. What we’re focusing on is being able to create more WAP traffic from our in-mobile web traffic, from our SMS traffic using AdHaven, and then being able to deliver a consistent advertising message in the SMS content and then the WAP content as well.

Q: I know from our past conversations that you understand the importance of targeting and relevancy. What are you doing about it?

A: Yes, we’re doing a lot in that direction. We’re a little bit careful of exactly what we disclose about our targeting algorithms; just given the competitive nature of the business. But I can say that if you look at where we’ve come from – from a standard ad-server that does campaign reporting – we can say we are ready to really start looking at behavioral type targeting. It has come a long way in the course of the last 6 months, and so have we.

Q: So it sounds imminent. Are you going to let me in on it?

A: Absolutely! When I’m ready to tell, you’ll be the first person I call.

Q: I’ll take you up on that one. While we’re on the topic of targeting and relevancy, I’m seeing less of an emphasis on mobile search, the capability that we thought was a pre-requisite for all this. The scenario was: You get the clues from the queries and deliver relevant ads. Now JumpTap is first and foremost an ad network, and other search companies have likewise changed their focus – and you didn’t mention it once in our interview…

A: The market is growing up. If we look at it from a JumpTap perspective; we see a carrier-centered model, one that I didn’t necessarily believe in. I definitely believe in the people in that company [JumpTap] and their focus on the advertising business. We [at 4INFO] are still big believers in the viability of search for consumers via free and open SMS and WAP and other methods, but we also understand that this is a point where mobile advertising is going to be a core piece of whatever comes out of search. We definitely still have our search business. We definitely still have our consumer-facing business. But, at the same time, you’ve got to make money, and we’re focused on making sure that we’re not only the leaders in search, but also the leaders in mobile media and technology; which I think search is a subset of.

Q: So it’s also ensuring growth through a more open approach?

A: Yes. Consumers are still absolutely able to use 4INFO for all the different services that you’ve seen before. Now the only difference is we don’t just do advertising of our own services. We provide advertising services for a huge number of different publishers; whether they are search or content or other types of alerts.

Q: Speaking of publishers, I see a strong focus on premium content publishers. Can you update me on how this is progressing?

A: We have a self-service platform for small publishers. and that’s our opened-up 4INFO.net.

For us though, we’re more interested in the short tail of premium publishers, high-quality content, and that’s what we focused our network on – not the more self-service, less interesting publishers. We just launched AOL and CBS on our network, and you don’t get much more premium than AOL or CBS.

Q: Of course, other companies are focused on premium content and publishers. I’m thinking here of JumpTap and its new Premium Ad Network…

A: There’s going to be competition for premium content. I’m [we're] not competitive with JumpTap. We are not looking to just take all of their run-of-the-mill mobile Web traffic. What we want to do is when a customer gets an SMS message and then clicks on a piece of content in that message to go to the mobile Web or video, then we’re creating that inventory – we’re creating new WAP inventory or mobile Web inventory and then we’re delivering a consistent advertising experience from the SMS message to the WAP message.

What you don’t want to have happen is:  Honda buys the SMS message and then sees Toyota on the WAP site where they’re directly trying to target that user. So it’s not competitive to what JumpTap is doing. They’re going after pure mobile Web traffic. We’re going after the traffic that’s being created; that we’re creating from SMS. It’s a fine distinction, but it’s an important one.

Q: What are some of the numbers? Nielsen named you the number one in SMS messaging, and your press release says: “The 4INFO advertising network of over 16 million users is ad-supported, with 4INFO customizing targeted, interactive SMS, WAP, and mobile video campaigns on behalf of its advertising partners and publishers. 4INFO delivers over eighty million real-time, user-requested answers and alerts via text message per month.” What can you add?

A: This year we’ll send over 2 billion SMS messages. We also will create from that SMS traffic, a little over 2 billion WAP impressions and video and mobile web impressions. So from there, we’ve grown into a pretty big network.

Q: A while back the discussion was that all this messaging is effectively costing more than it is bringing in…

A: No, not at all. We have fixed rate costs for all of our messaging services. Obviously, there’s no ad-serving. We don’t license any technology… all of this is built in-house. So no, the reality is if you understand our business, you understand it’s a business with huge operating leverage and stability to be a 60-70 percent gross margin-type company.

Q: What about the advertising experience. I have spoken with Taptu, a mobile search company that is thinking about the Touch Web and the new forms of advertising it enables. So it’s not just going to be text going forward. Again, the iPhone changes everything – including advertising. Does this present a challenge?

A: No, our belief in mobile advertising is that it’s delivering the best consumer experience possible. So if you’re on an iPhone or on a smartphone and you can get rich media video, then we’ll absolutely deliver that to you. And I talked a little about how AdHaven is going to be not just including SMS advertising, but also helping publishers drive WAP content from mobile Web content or iPhone content from that SMS content, and then serving ads there as well. So we see the better that phones get; the more interactive they get; the richer media they get, the easier it will be for us to then deliver sites in motion for our advertisers. So we’re all for smartphones and, as we continue to adapt with the markets, you’ll see us do more with rich media in the U.S. and less internationally where it’s less prevalent.

Q: What is the competitive landscape out there shaping up like? I know of a lot of other companies that insert ads into text, for example.

A: I think there’s going to be some companies coming out there and hey, let them come. The more in the market, the better the experience we’re all going to have. We think of ourselves as the 800-pound gorilla in the SMS space, and we think we’ll be the 800-pound gorilla in the mobile advertising space and that’s where we’re headed. But the more people that are educated in the market that are in the market, the better. There’s not just room for one person.

Q: What are the drivers? In Europe we see that companies like Blyk don’t just offer ads for free minutes, they have harnessed SMS to start brand conversations…

A: Europe has primarily a premium model and I think there’s now a place; now that the advertising market has matured to the point where the large U.S. advertisers and agencies that have global reach understand how to use mobile advertising better. We’ve got over 200 brands that ran on the platform in 2008.I think you’ll start to see more of that in Europe, which is why we’re releasing AdHaven for international so that there can be a mix of that premium and free model; a mix of that giving away free mobile marketing content for a subsidy model. And we’ll bring all of our large agency partners and brand partners in the U.S. over to some of the existing European and Asian operations.