IIR MOBILE ADVERTISING CONFERENCE: Vodafone’s Richard Saggers Talks Strategy & Stats; Smart Is Better Than Dumb, So Why Don’t Mobile Operators Use Mobile Advertising More To Their Advantage?
I’m back in the blogosphere after an incredibly useful week running IIR’s Mobile Advertising event where 95 participants were treated to great presentations from thought and market leaders, lively panel discussions, and worthwhile networking sessions that lasted long into the cold Budapest nights. Here’s my pick of the highlights…Everyone talks about mobile advertising, but the reality is too few are actually putting their money where their mouth is. The bottom line: Brands must become more involved.
BTW, building on the success of this three-day event, and the wealth of good ideas exchanged in the sessions, I’m well into planning Mobile Advertising 2008 as we speak. A lack of brand involvement may be a problem for the wider mobile advertising industry, but I can assure you advertisers will certainly be in the majority at my next event.
But brands will only buy in when they can be assured of the reach and the PKIs that they know from other media such as print, TV and radio. How do we get there from here? Looks like cross-operator collaboration, which by definition delivers brands and advertisers a boost in user volume, is the new buzzword. Indeed, Richard Saggers, Head of Mobile Advertising, Vodafone Global, advertising guru and conference keynote, is a convert and used his presentation to outline progress in this direction (which MSG also reported last month here).
In his view, operators can drive revenue from off-portal advertising by becoming ’smart-pipe’ operators. His advice: Operators should position themselves as enablers and generate revenue from off-portal advertising by ensuring quality of delivery, validation services and by selling APIs to aggregators.
Richard indicated the ’smart pipe’ strategy is paying off for Vodafone – and that isn’t all.
Mobile advertising stats are also buoyant throughout the Voda footprint. Most notably: 80 percent of users accept mobile advertising in the Czech Republic, and South African SMS advertising increased traffic by 130 percent with 2.5 million unique users per day.
CROSS OPERATOR COLLABORATION : Anthony Sheehan, Senior Director at Qualcomm, emphasized the pivotal importance of cross operator collaboration, arguing the somewhat obvious (but often overlooked) fact that advertisers want to reach the whole of their market segment in the easiest possible way. Building a working relationship with each operator takes time and will only hinder growth in this nascent market.
Julia McNally, a Director at New Visions, a mobile media agency, agreed that reach is a major issue. Her solution: Operators must provide a feedback loop to aid collaboration between themselves and media agencies and brands. (This may be tough since customer data is considered the operator’s crown jewels…) Nonetheless, Julia reasoned that operators – if they would sell or at least share their stockpile of user information – could create a win-win situation for everyone. Media buyers would be able to give more data to their clients and brands would be able to deliver more targeted and successful campaigns.
(BTW – Julia told me that KylieKonnect had 500k page impressions in its first week and Kylie plans to deliver lots of exclusive content to users which will help Julia sell ads galore: Watch this space.)
FLAT-RATE DATA PRICING: Nothing new here. The lack of flat-rate data tariffs is the root problem. Until it’s the norm users will end up paying to receive advertising – and it’s a no-brainer that won’t work. An interesting analogy comes from Olivia O’Toole, CNN International Marketing Manager. In her view, just as an unborn baby gets its nutrients from the placenta, the mobile advertising industry needs operators in order to survive. But in order to grow into maturity (and crucially a critical mass that will get advertisers interested), flat rate data pricing is essential.
YOUTH MARKET: It was also great to hear from Blyk – the boldest and youngest in this space. (Thanks to Geoff Morley, Blyk’s Head of Strategy, who stepped onto the podium as a last minute replacement.) The audience was waiting to hear Blyk’s latest figures – and Geoff didn’t disappoint. Currently, advertisers engaging with Blyk’s 16-24 year old subscribers are getting an average response rate of 35 percent with the top campaign delivering 43 percent (and the ‘worst’ a hugely enviable 12 percent).
LOYALTY & CHURN: Martin Kaiser, Content Manager at Bouygues Telecom, shared his vision to use mobile content as a tool to retain customers and (in the long term) as an ad vehicle. The company has struggled to keep users who pay for subscription services on its i-mode portal with an average of 30 percent churning each month. But retention rates for free content compared to subscription content were five times higher. The message comes through loud and clear: Free content keeps users for longer. Bouygues has also experimented successfully with hybrid pricing structures. For example, users can pay a subscription for 6 months and then access the service for free for life. In a trial of this particular business model, Bouygues reports retention rates were as high as 70 percent, delivering subscription revenues in the short term and an audience for advertising in the long term.
BTW, slides from the event can be purchased from IIR for GBP399. For more information call customer services on +44 (0)20 7017 7483, quote the event code CG2411MSG and then download them from www.iir-conferences.com/mobileadvertising .
