Posts tagged Mobile Advertising

Web Ad Firms Bet on Phones Getting More PC-Like

3 years ago
by admin in ,

Smartphones are becoming "smarter" all the time. But does that mean profits ahead for online ad sellers and content owners?

NEW YORK — As mobile phones become more like PCs, Internet companies are betting that they’ll find a new medium in which to thrive.

But that’s still some time away, experts said here today at the ThinkMobile conference and expo. After all, mobile advertisers and content providers have barely begun to bring the techniques that work on the Internet to mobile phones. And today, it’s the wireless carriers who dominate the cash flow in the mobile content industry, from advertising to subscription services. (ThinkMobile is produced by Mediabistro, which is part of WebMediaBrands, the parent company of this Web site.)

Still, the expectation is that as smartphones proliferate and grow in power, they’ll enable their owners to escape carriers’ locked-in environments — paving the way for a true PC-like Net experience, along with benefits for online media companies, advertisers and other Internet firms.

"These are complex ecosystems," said Tom Henriksson, head of Nokia Interactive Advertising, during a panel discussion here today. "Industries are colliding, and there will be many winners, not just one."

or content providers, the initial opportunity is to raise awareness of and drive traffic to brands that are outside the mobile space. Real advertising profits, meanwhile, will have to wait for the industry to mature.

During his opening keynote here, Salil Dalvi, NBC’s senior vice president of mobile platform development, said it’s about focusing on the obvious. That means delivering entire episodes of NBC shows to mobile devices and delivering stock quotes from CNBC. The value for NBC is in brand awareness, not revenue.

Dalvi said that the sole mobile content revenue stream for NBC comes from apps sold in the iPhone store, such as the Cylon Detector App, related to the popular Battlestar Galactica show on NBC’s Sci-Fi channel, which retails for $1.99.

Looking for mobile ad profits

Others — like Yahoo, Google (with its recently acquired ad network DoubleClick), Microsoft, Nokia and AOL — are still angling for mobile ad revenues. Yet there’s not that much to go around at the moment.

While Greg Stuart, former CEO of the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) trade association said that mobile ad spending may have topped $600 million in 2008, he added that about $500 million of that went to premium SMS.

That leaves Internet companies scrambling for the remaining $100 million or less. And of that total, 70 percent or more of that spend already goes to Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Nokia and AOL, representatives from the companies claimed during a panel today.

The low returns so far haven’t stopped major established companies and venture capitalists from investing a multiple of that $100 million into the mobile ad business, said Phil Miano, national director of mobile advertising sales for AOL’s Platform A, who spoke during a panel today.

They’re wagering that mobile ads are on the cusp of growth, but industry insiders questioned how soon that might come about.

"Every year since 1998, the mobile industry has said that ‘Now is the time for mobile,’" Stuart said. "What makes 2009 different?"

Ad spending on mobile devices will grow when that spend is an "above line" item in ad agency budgets, said Michael Bayle, senior director of mobile advertising at Yahoo. For now, even in the most innovative cross-platform campaigns, it represents 10 to 15 percent of the media buy at most.

For content providers, the carrier networks — rather than Internet firms — today represent the dominant sources of revenue. Dalvi said that NBC is being nice to the carriers, but "it’s easy to be nice to someone when you have a positive financial relationship with them."

For now, that’s often cutting out the folks who stand to make the most from the Net’s growing role in mobile, since DoubleClick display ad trafficking and Google search have yet to make serious inroads with the carriers.

Behind the scenes, however, the big Internet players are working on technology to make it simpler for advertisers to buy mobile media — and hopefully, more enticing.

Robert Victor, product manager for emerging technologies at Google’s DoubleClick subsidiary, said that if an agency today wants to spend $2 million on mobile the same way it would spend that money online, it can’t, due to the space’s fragmented market.

"You could go to a single major player like Nokia," he said, "but it’s tough to execute a complex plan like you would on the Internet. We see an exchange business in the future that will enable more fluid transactions."

There are other hurdles to surmount, as well. As the Internet advertising business moves to complex metrics, the mobile media business is still selling ads based on the number of people who view them — using the Cost Per Thousand metric, or CPM (define), rather than more modern approaches that track engagement or activity after seeing an ad.

Moving away from CPM metrics also could lay the groundwork for advertising to make use of some of the unique benefits of mobile — like wireless downloads, redeemable mobile coupons and location-based services.

But today, the content on those phones is similar to what’s available on the PC, Dalvi said, who added that NBC focuses on reaching people on their mobile phones only when they lack PC access or want a specific piece of information immediately. He added that NBC would like to deliver applications like banking and shopping, and advertisers would like to deliver more targeted ads.

Part of the problem is that content providers are only able to sell ads based on older metrics because there’s not yet enough mobile content available.

Still, he added, the wireless space does have its benefits for content companies.

"At least for now, there’s no glut of content," Dalvi said.

MWC: GSMA mobile metrics service to go live in UK

3 years ago
by admin in

Tim Green at Mobile World Congress Feb 16 2009, 12:05am

The GSMA will launch its ‘media packs for mobile’ service in the second half of 2009.

It has greenlighted the project for a UK roll-out following the completion of a ‘media metrics’ feasibility study launched at Mobile World Congress in 2008.

That project was conducted with the five UK operators – Telefónica O2, Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile and 3 – plus data gathering specialists such as ComScore/M:Metrics.

It aimed to create a base of ‘anonymised, aggregated and audited’ data. The idea is to make this available to agencies and brands so that they can target mobile users by region, demographics, time of day and so on.

This information can make mobile a legitimate option alongside TV, radio, posters when agencies buy media.

The project has massive potential. Although the GSMA is playing down the $250 billion market figure mentioned last year, the initiative clearly represents a tremendous opportunity for an industry looking to counter falling voice and data ARPUs.

But what about the global recession? The GSMA believes this actually makes it the perfect time for action. Henry Stevens, director of media and entertainment at the GSMA, told ME: "It’s more important that ever to get it going now. Advertising goes in cycles: this is our chance to get mobile metrics in place for the next upturn."

He also hopes that the project will spread quickly into other geographies. "Every region has its own way of doing things, but it’s going to be so much quicker to launch when you have a live launch to study and replicate," he added.

The GSMA believes the programme will allow brands to understand how mobile can best complement other media in marketing plans. It found, for example, that the 7-10am period accounts for 22 per cent of total mobile minutes browsed, compared with only 11 per cent of minutes browsed by PC Internet users in the same hours.

The data also provides insight into the most popular sites, ranked by number of visitors, page impressions, time and duration of visits. Indeed, the results of the study of 167,648 mobile Internet sites show that 68 per cent of UK mobile users visit operator portal, Google is the top off-portal destination and Facebook is the top mobile site by time spent browsing.

The GSMA will now establish three further working groups, one each for advertisers, media/advertising agencies, and publishers. These working groups will confirm the measurement and reporting needs of each, and establish ‘common currency’ for mobile audience measurement.

Jinny Launches Fully-Managed Mobile Marketing and Advertising Service

3 years ago
by admin in

New end-to-end service will enable rapid generation of fresh revenue streams and media campaigns for operators and advertising sector

Barcelona, 16 February, 2009 – Jinny Software (Stand 2B06 Hall 2), a leading global supplier of messaging and media platforms to mobile network operators, today launches a fully-managed Mobile Marketing & Advertising Service at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

The primary business model for Jinny’s new Mobile Marketing & Advertising Service is to provide advertising from the agencies to the operator as a managed service and to share the revenue earned from advertising with the operator. This revenue-share commercial model removes the need for operators to incur the up-front CAPEX required to build and implement the solution. Jinny manages contractual relationships with the advertising agencies and brands, and will invoice these parties for the campaigns run across the platform.

The new service takes responsibility for managing almost every aspect of a mobile advertising campaign for operators and advertisers, enabling them to implement comprehensive mobile marketing and advertising strategies quickly and effectively. It offers the complete range of marketing and advertising channels expected from the mobile environment, from straightforward insertion into application-to-person messages, through to the delivery of Internet advertising and inbound/outbound campaigns.

Alexandra Rehak, Principal Analyst and specialist in the field of mobile advertising at leading research house Analysys Mason, commented, “Growing mobile advertising revenue without over-investing in non-core skill sets and services is a major challenge for mobile operators, particularly in the current economic environment. Outsourcing mobile advertising creation, integration and sales to a specialist partner can be an effective means for operators to broaden their mobile advertising portfolios while at the same time extending their reach to a wider audience of potential media buyers.”

The following are just some of the functions handled by the service:
• Commercial Functions – e.g. payment, reconciliation and settlement;
• Campaign Design and Reporting – e.g. campaign design tools and processes, and campaign execution over a range of delivery channels;
• System Integrity – e.g. campaign monitoring, database management, hardware monitoring, report management and interface monitoring;
• Network Integration – campaigns can be run over SMS, USSD, MMS, WAP or HTTP delivery channels.

A major benefit of the new service for operators is Jinny’s established advertising agency relationships globally, which ensures mobile operators will not have to take this complex responsibility on themselves, or establish a sales force to sell mobile inventory – Jinny will conduct all this through its agency partners.

For the advertising agencies, the service allows them to employ the mobile channel to initiate a dialogue with a consumer through outbound and inbound messaging. Customer responses are recorded and stored by the system to deepen the advertiser’s understanding of the consumer, making subsequent campaigns more meaningful and more likely to trigger a dialogue with the target audience.

Cathal O’Toole, Head of Mobile Advertising at Jinny Software, said, “Many of the functions in the delivery of a successful mobile marketing and advertising service to advertisers will distract operators from their core business. That’s why we’re offering the industry this comprehensive, fully-managed service to remove these pressures, with Jinny handling all of the demands of the advertising agencies and brands. So, from the time an advertiser plans to deliver a message to the time they receive campaign results, the brand and their agencies will have everything they need to deliver an effective and successful campaign. And by adopting Jinny’s Mobile Marketing and Advertising Service operators will hit the ground running in the generation of revenues from mobile advertising.”

In February last year the company announced its successful trial of its Advertising Engine – the platform at the heart of its new fully-managed service offering – to deliver high volume SMS, MMS, and WAP advertisements for Zain in Jordan. Since then, the company has supplied its Advertising Engine to the leading telecom supplier, Ericsson in the Middle East where a new implementation has taken place with another large operator. Jinny Software is in discussions with many other operators in that region, and beyond, and expects to make more announcements shortly.

Jinny’s new fully-managed Mobile Marketing and Advertising Service is available now to operators around the world. For those operators that wish to purchase and manage their own advertising service, Jinny can still supply the complete technical solution with its Advertising Engine, and train an operator’s staff in managing the commercial and technical requirements of the system themselves.

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Jinny’s Service Oriented Environment meets SDP requirements of
Zain Tanzania
Suite of integrated solutions delivers Service Delivery Platform solution

Barcelona, 16 February 2009 – Jinny Software, a leading global supplier of messaging and media platforms to mobile network operators, today announced that it has met the needs of Zain Tanzania for a Service Delivery Platform (SDP) with Jinny’s Service Oriented Environment approach to service delivery, which has provided the operator with a suite of integrated solutions in the form of Jinny’s SMSC, Message Router, VoiceSMS and Voicemail products. Together with Jinny’s Ringback Tone Server and Charging Gateway, already implemented on the network and generating high return-on-investment, these homogeneous products provide the operator with a fully integrated and effective service delivery solution.

Zain Tanzania required a comprehensive VAS strategy, including a Service Oriented Environment approach. Jinn addressed a number of key operator challenges, which focused on improving speed of service introduction and time-to-market, the ability to reduce OPEX and CAPEX and the need to offer full call completion and ARPU-generating solutions.

Jinny recommended, and implemented, an integrated solution where all components are interconnected and use a common interface to the external world. With one interface to the billing system, all VAS components can be rated and a single command can be sent to the IN system for charging. A major factor in the selection for Zain Tanzania was the product integration built into Jinny’s solutions, making it unnecessary for the operator to become involved in complex integration issues between VAS components.

“We are very satisfied with our engagement with Jinny Software”, says Name, IT Director, Zain Tanzania, “their consultative approach to our challenges and the solution strategy proposed was very welcome and their Service Oriented Environment approach meets our SDP needs perfectly. Our experience working with them has been very positive.”

George Yazbek, Strategic Marketing Manager of Jinny Software, explained, “Effective service delivery relies on assets used in the normal, everyday functioning of most mobile networks. Operator inventories already include a plethora of solutions for the delivery and execution of new subscriber services, solutions which, when used individually, provide a specific function, but when employed en masse in an integrated manner, can create their own powerful Service Delivery Environment.

“Without the need for new and complex protocols to drive even more complex Service Delivery Platform solutions, these key operator assets are the strengths which can be leveraged now, to implement effective, long-term service delivery strategies. We are delighted that Zain Tanzania has adopted our service delivery approach,” Yazbek concluded.

Jinny’s Regional Director, Aniket Deuskar, added, “Our strategic engagement with Zain Tanzania on this deal illustrates Jinny Software’s ability to be a solution provider bringing strong solutions to the table and not just powerful, stand-alone products. We look forward to strengthening our co-operation with Zain Tanzania in the future.”

About Jinny Software – www.jinny.ie
Jinny Software enables mobile network operators to drive revenue, manage costs, retain customers and shorten time-to-market through a range of messaging and media solutions and services and a fully managed mobile advertising service.

Jinny’s product suite includes highly efficient, future-proof core messaging platforms and ARPU-enhancing applications built on open and common architectures.

Our mobile advertising managed services team offers a fully-managed service to operators to implement their mobile advertising strategy. Jinny’s delivers the technical solution to implement mobile advertising, the commercial solution to handle relationships with agencies and brands, and comprehensive support on campaigns for design, management, and reporting.

Implementation, project management, support and training is provided by Jinny’s service teams located in Brazil, Ireland, Kenya, UAE, Panama and Malaysia.

Jinny Software operates from its headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, regional headquarters in Dubai, UAE, and sales offices in Sao Paulo and Kuala Lumpur. Jinny Software is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Acotel Group S.p.A, headquartered in Rome, Italy and traded on the Milan stock market (ACO.MI).

For further information please contact:
Marketing Department,
Jinny Software Ltd.,
29 North Anne Street,
Dublin 7, Ireland.
Tel: +353 1 887 2626
Email: info@jinny.ie

For media and analyst relations enquiries please contact:
Tim Guest
Global Media & Analyst Relations
Tel: +44 7956 257069
Email: timjguest@btconnect.com

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