TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business

What the ad industry learnt from 2011 and how they foresee 2012

Years come and go but each year leaves behind its own learnings. 2011 was no different. Ad industry leaders share the lessons that they learnt and how they foresee the shape of things in 2012. Whenever a year draws to a close, it is not just about a new beginning but also about retrospection. The idea is to assess what could have been done differently, gather one’s forces anew and make a fresh…

How prepared is your advertising agency for 2012?

December has been a month of conversations, trying to make sense of the year ahead for advertising, media, digital and PR agencies. As the stock market gets hammered, as the anti-corruption movement ebbs and flows, and as the government is semi-paralysed, what will 2012 hold for all? In a nutshell, it’s not going to be an easy year – but there are still those who will gain and those who will hold their own. Here’s the year ahead, in

Analytics: The brains behind mobile marketing success

Mobile analytics in action. Look at a retailer such as Dick’s Sporting Goods that wants to drive in-store traffic and promote new merchandise. Knowing that someone works just a few blocks away and is headed out for his lunch break allows a carrier to deliver relevant messaging directly to the device, marrying mobile data that it has with point-of-sale data that the store has on a customer’s brand preferences.

Pre-Roll, Mobile Top Video Ad Formats for 2012

Online video has reached critical mass among US internet viewers. eMarketer predicts 169 million people, or 71% of US internet users, will be watching online video each month by the end of 2012. Such a healthy, sizeable audience can’t help but capture advertiser attention. eMarketer estimates US online video ad spending (not all of which is placed against video) will enjoy an aggressive 40% year-over-year increase from 2011, topping $3.1 billion in 2012.

2012 Forecast: Mobile Marketing

Having been involved in the mobile and advertising industries for over two decades, I can say with confidence that 2011 was a banner year for the discipline. Over the past year, consumers have proven that the mobile phone has become an integral part of the shopping experience. This is creating a number of exciting new opportunities for marketers to reach consumers at multiple touchpoints throughout the buying process.

Advertising legend MAURICE SAATCHI celebrates the joy of simple ideas that changed the world

The ideas that have changed our lives most are often the simplest. Simple ideas enter the brain more quickly and stay there longer.  Winston Churchill was a great believer in simplicity. He liked to quote a letter by French mathematician Blaise Pascal that started: ‘I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.’ He knew that to achieve simplicity is very hard.

Mobile carriers: Five predictions for 2012

The biggest news for 2011 in this sector was AT&T’s $39 billion bid to buy T-Mobile. And when the deal was announced in March, AT&T seemed confident it could make it happen. So confident in fact, that it agreed to one of the biggest break-up fees ever. But as we all now know, regulators didn’t like AT&T’s plan and put a kibosh on its plans.

Samsung dominates mobile phone market

Samsung accounted for 25.6 percent of U.S. mobile handsets for three months ending November 11, according to research by ComScore. This translates into a slight market share increase of 0.3 percent. Apple came in fourth place behind LG and Motorola with 11.2 percent market share, though it gained the most market share over the period, increasing by 1.4 percent.

Mobile Marketing’s Crystal Ball: Predicting Trends for 2012

The past year has been a big one for smartphones and other mobile devices. In addition to achieving widespread adoption among U.S. consumers, the tools have transformed the way people shop, get information and interact with friends, family and brands. In a column for Search Engine Land, Matt Lawson predicts that mobile will undergo even more changes and developments in 2012. Mobile marketing is becoming a bigger focus in many ad agencies and is taking up a larger proportion of overall advertising budgets, yet it also creates many challenges for those in the industry, he notes.

ComScore: Android, iOS combine for 75% of U.S. smartphone market

Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android and Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iOS extended their dominance over the U.S. mobile market in November 2011 and now power a combined 75.6 percent of all smartphones nationwide according to new data published by digital research firm comScore.

Six Steps To Mobile Search Marketing Success

ADOTAS – Tablet and smart phone devices have forever changed the search marketing landscape, as the year of mobile has finally happened. Tablet sales were up 260 percent year-on-year during the first three quarters of 2011, according to PC World magazine, while IDC projected sales of more than 63 million tablets, including the Amazon Kindle Fire and Barnes and Noble’s Nook, in the fourth quarter. This technology shift is altering consumer search behavior and requires a different approach to marketing.

Nigeria to become dominant in Africa’s mobile payment market

With the commencement of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) cashless project, Nigeria is set to become a dominant player in Africa’s emerging mobile payments market, analysts have said. According to the industry analysts, about 20 million Nigerians are expected to be embraced into the formal banking system via mobile money over the next three years. In November, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) had disclosed that 40 million mobile money users currently exist in Africa.

Mobile marketing and advertising budgets to increase in 2012

This year 2012, mobile advertising/marketing spend is largely seen to increase in the US market, according to Digital Marketer managing editor. One big factor that leads to said prediction is the rising sales of Smartphones in the region, giving a perfect indicator for advertisers to double up their efforts in reaching to the public consumers. In fact, according to recent Nielsen’s report, there are about 43% of Americans having Smartphones with them.

Last year’s overall sales volume on Smartphone reached up to $5 billion; and while it sounds a huge number, Digital Marketer said it represents only to an equivalent of 2% of the total online ecommerce market. Had it been lesser than that of 2% being on Smartphone, it could never have been an attractive market for advertisers.

According to Digital Marketer, a pragmatic approach to mobile marketing has been wise up until now, and that all signs are pointing directly to increases in mobile marketing and advertising budgets. Last year’s 0.9% of advertising dollars went to mobile marketing spent will be expected to improve at a bigger percentage for this year.

TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business


2012 Trends to Watch: Marketing

As customers increasingly embrace multichannel interactions, marketers will collaborate more across formerly siloed teams to ensure a consistent customer experience regardless of communication, device, or touchpoint. 2011 was a year of collaboration in marketing. Marketers worked more closely with their sales counterparts, partnered with IT to harness new technologies for customer engagement, and even joined forces across marketing silos to improve the multichannel customer experience.

Why Marketers May Finally Get on the Mobile Advertising Boat

While print media represents only 8% of consumer time spent, it accounts for 27% of marketers’ media spending. Mobile media, on the other hand, represents 8% of consume time, yet only .5% of marketers’ media spending. Why the disparity? I believe there are three reasons: 1) Mobile advertising has yet to show scalable reach that has a demonstrable ROI. The reach of print advertising is clearly known, and the way consumers interact with print ads has been well researched for decades.

Mobile Advertising and Marketing – 5th Edition: Mobile advertising to grow 15.2%

There are close to 6 billion active mobile subscriptions across the globe, which can be compared with about 2 billion Internet users. This underpins the vast potential of the mobile channel for advertising and marketing, being highly important for brands seeking to engage in communication with present and potential customers. Berg Insight estimates that the total value of the global mobile marketing and advertising market was € 2.61 billion in 2010, having experienced healthy growth throughout the financial crisis and the following recuperation. Growing at a compound annual growth rate of 36.9 percent, the market is forecasted to be worth € 17.2 billion in 2016 – corresponding to 15.2 percent of the total digital advertising market. Mobile advertising is at the same time predicted to account for 3.8 percent of the total global ad spend for all media.

US mobile ad expenditure more than doubles to $2.1 billion in 2011, Google dominates, according to IDC

According to estimates by IDC, US $2.1 billion was spent on mobile advertising in the US in 2011. That’s more than double the expenditure in 2010. The split between mobile search and mobile display advertising spend is roughly 70:30. This is part of the reason that IDC attributes a massive 70 percent market share to Google (IDC describes Google as a “near monopoly” in search), but IDC believes Google is the market leader in display advertising in the US also. No other rival mobile ad network has more than 5 percent market share. Number two to six are Millennial Media, Apple, Yahoo!, Microsoft and Jumptap. All other networks have less than 1 percent share of the US market.

Trends for 2012: Asia-Pacific

India’s mobile market will take its first steps toward long-overdue consolidation. The market is much too crowded, with 17 mobile licensees, leading to extreme price competition and erosion of margins. The regulator’s intention to reduce SMS interconnection and roaming charges might be the final catalyst driving consolidation. Pyramid Research has found that large and small markets alike tend toward a three-to-four nationwide operator competitive environment. We expect initial consolidation to take place between 3G and non-3G license holders or for operators to seek alliances to achieve nationwide coverage.

Emotional Connections Key to 2011’s Best-Liked TV Ads

The best-liked new TV ads of 2011 reflected the value of traditional ad elements such as strong creative, simple and engaging messaging, and a solid emotional connection, according to December 2011 analysis from Nielsen. The most-liked ad, with a “likeability” index of 231, was a Super Bowl spot for Volkswagen’s Passat, in which a boy dressed as Darth Vader believes he used “the force” to turn on a car. The index score of 231 means that among viewers, Volkswagen’s ad proved to be 131% better-liked than the average new commercial during the January 1 – November 30 period.

Branding Time: Are Marketers Missing the Moment?

Do you know where your customers are? Data, networks, and content are becoming more and more intertwined. As the number of screens people have in their lives continues to grow, and new platforms and services ask people to take new actions in their daily lives, there are heightened demands on all of us. It seems that life in the networked world is, in many ways, far more complex than what many futurists — assuming that technology would simplify things for us — had imagined for the year 2011.

How data will impact 2012 for brands, merchants

The recognition of the value of data and its role in driving effectiveness. We are beginning to see increasing moves to bring offline data into the online arena, as this type of data is trusted and has long been the backbone of delivering traditional offline marketing campaigns. This move towards amalgamation is especially evident from the larger brands, who want to use these same audience definitions to deliver their online activity. For them it gives them the confidence they are reaching exactly the same audience on and offline, fostering real multi-channel marketing.

TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business

Forecast: Mobile retail marketing spending to reach $15B in 2012

Marketers will spend $15 billion globally on mobile retail campaigns in 2012–a 50 percent increase over 2011–according to a new forecast issued by Juniper Research. The firm adds that mobile retail marketing spend is accelerating faster in North America and Western Europe than it is in the Far East and China.

Global market for mobile video $30bn by 2017

GIA (Global Industry Analysts) says the market for mobile video services is projected to reach $30 billion by 2017, primarily driven by factors such as continued deployment of high-speed mobile networks, increasing availability of sophisticated mobile phones that enable users to download and play videos, introduction of economical data plans by service providers and growing popularity of social networking sites among mobile users. Robust demand from developing markets such as Asia-Pacifica and Latin America also augurs well for the market.

Mobile Shopping Creates a $15bn Opportunity for Retail Marketing and Advertising in 2012

A new report from Juniper Research has found that value of mobile retail marketing will reach $15 billion globally by 2012 as digital adspend moves to mobile and mobile coupons gain acceptance. This is a growth of 50% over 2011. The New Face of Shopping The report found that the smartphone, and more recently the tablet, has increased the capabilities of both the modern shopper and the mobile retail marketer. The marketer now has new marketing channels to attract the mobile shopper, but equally the shopper has more access to competitive product and pricing information before making a purchase.

Android, Samsung top U.S. mobile phone market

Android has widened its lead as the top smartphone OS in the U.S., according to the latest stats from ComScore. For the three months ending September, Google’s mobile platform grabbed 44.8 percent of the market, an increase of almost 5 points from the prior quarter. Apple’s iOS retained second place with a 27.4 percent share of U.S. smartphone owners, up slightly from the previous period.

Mobile ad market growing strong

S. KOREA – With the number of smartphone users in Korea on the rise, the mobile ad market is expanding amid signs of a broader shift in the advertising industry toward portable devices. While conventional ad markets for newspapers, magazines and TVs remain sluggish, smartphone users here are now exposed to 1,000 ads per month, promising new territory for advertisers and media firms.

Survey: Publishers Continue Cross-Media Diversification, Begin to Monetize Mobile

Magazines and newspapers in the U.S. and Canada are becoming more confident in their strategic mobile plans as they diversify their offerings and discover new ways to derive revenue. According to a new survey from the Audit Bureau of Circulations and ABC Interactive, “Going Mobile: How Publishers Are Maturing and Monetizing Their Offerings,” the number of publishers who say they have a well-developed plan for the mobile market rose to 59 percent, up from just 28 percent in 2009. And 67 percent said it was important to their strategic future to earn revenue from both ads and subscriptions.

Google Mobile Ad Sales See $2.5B Run Rate

Google’s mobile ad run-rate is a cool $2.5 billion and growing. But will mobile search revenues continue to double or swell greater? One of Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) big future bets is paying off well in the present, as the search engine’s mobile ad revenues are tracking to bank $2.5 billion in 2011

Mobile Brings New Opportunities for Local Retailers

Ecommerce sales are growing fast, but the vast majority of consumer spending still takes place offline in local stores. A large portion of those sales are influenced by online research, most of which is conducted on the desktop. But increasingly, consumers are taking advantage of the sophisticated capabilities of smartphones to do more of this online research while in a store or on the go.

TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business

IAB urges advertisers to be more creative on mobile

The IAB has urged advertisers to be more creative in their approach to mobile advertising and shed the “one size fits all” approach for more integrated strategies. The IAB says that mobile should now be considered as a separated medium rather than an add on to digital and predicts that marketing and advertising spend on mobile devices will be worth £1bn in the UK by 2015, reaching £4.3bn (€5bn) in Western Europe.

Reaching the Right Audience—Ad Targeting Trends

The webinar addresses these key questions: What ad targeting methods are most effective? How can marketers best blend audience and content targeting? How can marketers best use data to identify the right audience? How does testing and measuring improve relevancy?

In mobile, rich media pushing clicks

Mobile may be pushing an increasing amount of online traffic, but new data from Jumptap indicates that rich media, specifically, is pushing mobile clicks. Their research, conducted in September, found that the use of rich media in mobile campaigns increased click-thrus for Retail, Restaurant, Electronics and Auto categories.

Mobile Internet access grows sharply

More than 50% of South Africans polled in a recent survey say that they access the Internet daily from their cellphones and more than 57% engaged in some form of banking or financial activity using mobile phones according to a report published by Fin24, based on an article from the South African Press Association (Sapa). Sapa says that the survey was conducted by the Mobile Entertainment Forum and polled about 8 000 people in nine countries. Of the South Africans questioned, 89% reported using their cellphones to research or purchase a product.

Mobile Ad Effectiveness Helps Drive Investment

Whether or not the “year of mobile” ever comes—or has already passed—mobile ad spending is on the rise, largely due to the increasing smartphone and mobile web populations. Mobile display ad effectiveness is another factor driving marketer investment. Studies from InsightExpress, MediaMind(formerly Eyeblaster), and, as of Q3 2011, Dynamic Logic, have all demonstrated mobile display advertising to be more effective than online display advertising.

3 design principles for the mobile Web

With more than 5.3 billion mobile users worldwide and consumers spending an average of 9.8 hours on their mobile devices every week, it is no wonder that mobile campaigns are becoming ever more crucial for brands and advertisers. The mobile applications market is forecast to earn $25 billion in revenue by 2015, from around $6.8 billion in 2010. Apps are undoubtedly a great way to engage audiences, whether by educating, entertaining or informing.

Live TV Shows Command Ad Spot Premiums

TV shows that viewers tend to watch live, rather than play back days later, command a premium for marketers, according to survey results released in October 2011 by Advertising Age. Results from the survey, which measures the costs of running a 30-second commercial in prime time, indicate that NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” now challenges Fox’s “American Idol” as the most expensive program for advertisers.

What marketers really want from mobile advertising

Earlier this year, eMarketer published research stating that only one-third of marketers ran mobile ad campaigns in 2010, going up to 50 percent in 2011. However, most are running mobile ads sporadically or do not tie them to a larger marketing campaign.

Mobile Growth Stats & Mobile Web Tips to Start Marketing

Did you know that the U.S. now has more wireless customer connections than people? There are currently estimated to be 327.6 million active wireless customer connections in the U.S. The nation’s population is estimated by the U.S. Census Bureau to be roughly 312 million. This means that today there are now more active broadband tablets, cell phones, and mobile devices than people in this country.

Baidu Profit Rises 80% as China Search-Engine Ad Sales Surge

Oct. 28 (Bloomberg) — Baidu Inc., China’s biggest Internet company by market value, said third-quarter profit rose 80 percent, beating analysts’ estimates, as revenue from search- engine advertising surged. Net income attributable to Baidu climbed to 1.88 billion yuan ($296 million), or 5.38 yuan per American depositary receipt, compared with 1.05 billion yuan, or 3 yuan, a year earlier, Baidu said yesterday. That exceeded the 1.85 billion yuan average of eight analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business

Mobile advertising will generate $1.2B in 2011: study

A new study from eMarketer predicts mobile advertising will generate $1.23 billion in the United States this year. The forecast also expects mobile advertising in the U.S. to reach $4.4 billion by 2015. The growth comes as mobile advertising gains steam as an effective way to target consumers thanks to the growth in smartphone and tablet ownership.

Numbers Forecast Booming Mobile Ad Future

The message at the Borrell Associates Local Mobile Advertising Conference in Chicago was a simple matter of proliferation: Ubiquitous mobile users pair up with growing local advertising dollars spent, close to 20% of that headed online. Media analyst Gordon Borrell projected that by 2015 up to two-thirds of local advertising will be served up on mobile.

Cross-media measurement is Holy Grail of mobile: IAB

In order for brands and retailers to allocate more of their marketing budgets to mobile, measurement and reliable methodologies to understand audience behavior and ad effectiveness must be put into place, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau. According to the “State of Mobile Measurement,” study released by IAB, fragmentation, unclear standards and technology problems have held mobile from reaching its full potential. In order to get up to par, marketers have to create common measurement standards in mobile.

Smartphones, Mobile Internet Set Stage for Increased Mobile Ad Spend

By the end of this year, eMarketer estimates, 38% of US mobile users will have a smartphone and 41% will use the mobile internet at least once each month. These developments mean an increase in the opportunity for mobile advertising—and an increase in spending. eMarketer forecasts that advertisers will spend nearly $1.23 billion on mobile advertising this year in the US, up from $743 million last year and set to reach almost $4.4 billion by 2015. This includes spending on display ads (such as banners, rich media and video), search and messaging-based advertising, and covers ads viewed on both mobile phones and tablets.

How mobile advertising, content and commerce is changing Brazil

Emerging markets have experienced strong economical growth in the past several years, and four of the top five mobile markets are emerging markets: 1. China, 2. India, 3. U.S., 4. Russia, 5. Brazil. According to Anatel, the Brazilian regulatory agency that oversees wireless carriers, Brazil leads in terms of Latin American mobile penetration: Brazil 92 percent, Colombia 88 percent, Chile 75 percent, Argentina 72 percent and Mexico 63 percent.

Adidas campaign points to effectiveness of multiscreen advertising

Sportswear brand adidas ran a video-centric ad campaign across online, mobile and tablet devices. Carat is adidas’ agency of record. Carat tapped Google to extend the brand’s message to digital. “We partnered with Nielsen to measure the incremental impact of multiscreen advertising,” said Johanna Werther and Ben Chung, both part of the Google Mobile Ads Marketing team at Google, Mountain View, CA, in a blog post.

Global Web Ad Spend to Rise 33% by ‘13

Global internet advertising expenditures will rise about 33% between 2011 and 2013, according to [pdf] an October 2011 forecast from Zenith Optimedia. Internet ad spend is expected to total about $72.5 billion USD this year and reach $96.4 billion in 2013. Total global ad spend, forecast at $460.3 billion for 2011, is expected to grow about 11% to about $510.6 billion in 2013.

Apple’s mobile market share climbs in September

Apple’s iOS once again dominated the mobile OS market share picture in September, according to new data from Net Applications. The enterprise application maker and web monitoring company found that iOS accounted for 54.65 percent of mobile market share, up from just over 53 percent in August. The numbers mean that Apple’s iOS devices (including the iPod touch, iPhone and iPad) together make up more than half of all web use originating from mobile devices.

Mobile media needs ‘solid metrics’, says IAB

Cookies are unreliable; server logs are stymied; the ecosystem is fragmented and privacy concerns loom large – none of which changes the fact that mobile advertising needs a standardised set of measurements, according to a new IAB paper.

Mobile taking up increasing portion of consumers’ down time

Ad agencies that are designing digital marketing campaigns may reach more consumers if they include a mobile aspect to the mix, findings from a new survey suggest. CA Technologies commissioned a study that found due to the prevalence of mobile devices, users of smartphones and tablet computers are taking the usual “dead time” – the equivalent of about five and a half weeks – and using it more productively.

China Set for Explosive Ad Growth

While the US will still maintain a comfortable lead in ad spending in 2013, number three China’s spending will surge in the next two years,according to [pdf] an October 2011 forecast from Zenith Optimedia. China, expected to spend $26.1 billion USD on major media advertising this year, will increase that figure almost 49% to $38.5 billion in 2013. By comparison, the US will increase ad spend about 9%, from $151.7 billion this year to $166 billion in 2013. Number two Japan will also maintain its position, growing ad spend 3% from $46.1 billion to $47.6 billion.

Social Network Ad Revenues to Reach $10 Billion Worldwide in 2013

Worldwide social network ad revenues will reach $5.54 billion this year, eMarketer estimates, with just under half that amount, $2.74 billion, coming from the US market. Revenue growth is solidly in the double digits in the US, but even more rapid growth elsewhere will mean spending outside the country will account for a slightly greater share each year. By 2013, non-US revenues will make up 51.9% of the total, which will hit nearly $10 billion worldwide. In the US, social networks will make $4.81 billion from ads that year.

TheTMSway Weekly Radar on Mobile Marketing and Business

The Department of Energy has earmarked $41.9 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act for the development of fuel cell technology. The goal is to create manufacturing and maintenance jobs for Americans who have been laid off from automotive factories and the like

Quickoffice beats Microsoft to the punch with iPhone app for Office documents

Dallas-based Quickoffice has released the first iPhone application suite that lets you view and edit Microsoft Office documents. Available for $19.99 from the App Store, it includes its own versions of Word and Excel it calls Quickword and Quicksheets, as well as file-management services


Green technologies to watch

“We are in a new era of energy innovation,” declared Daniel Yergin last week at a forum on clean-energy policy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Seattle, Atlanta And D.C. To Get First Mobile TV Tests

A coalition of TV broadcasters on Monday said they plan to use Seattle, Atlanta and Washington, D.C., as test markets for digital mobile TV services this year.

Spam Harms Environment

According to a Silverpop survey conducted last year, 80% of e-mail recipients felt that spam levels were either about the same or getting worse.

Percent Mobile – find out what percentage of your visits come to you via mobile

The service that Percent Mobile offers is so simple its genius. It is a solution for online websites that tells you what % of your users came to your site via mobile.

Bango Debuts Updated Mobile Analytics v4

Bango has long been known for its advanced mobile analytics solutions, and today marks the release of the newest version- version 4, which takes mobile analytics and visitor tracking to a whole new level.

Social Email Campaigns to Increase Nearly 400% in 2009

A record number of email marketers are planning to bridge the gap between online social networks and their email marketing campaigns, and the number of social email initiatives is expected to grow 367% this year, according to new research

Poll: Today’s Society Too Dependent on Gadgets

Nearly two-thirds (65%) of Americans think that today’s society is too dependent upon electronic gadgets, and 39% do not think technology (such as mobile phones, Wi-Fi networks and GPS) really makes people more productive, according to (pdf) a recent Harris Poll

Mobile not one channel, but eight: MobileMix speaker

It was expected. Someone in the audience at the final ad:tech San Francisco MobileMix session had to ask that dreaded question: “Everyone has been saying this is the year of mobile for five years. Is it?”


B2B Magazines Expand Online

Business-to-business (B2B) print magazines have fallen on tough times. While many publishers realize they have to be online in order to survive, they have been slow to take the digital plunge as they struggle to figure out a viable online strategy.

Court of Appeal overturns judgement to privatise PCCW

The Court of Appeal has overturned the judgment of the High Court of Hong Kong to sanction the scheme of arrangement to privatise Hong Kong operator PCCW. The company is disappointed at the Court of Appeal’s decision, given the clear findings and reasons set out for the judgment of the High Court.

China Telecom picks Huawei for 3G CDMA launch

Huawei Technologies has joined China Telecom for the commercial launch of 3G CDMA networks in many of China’s largest cities and regions. Using Huawei’s equipment, China Telecom’s 3G CDMA services are now available in 52 cities