Tag Archives: iAd
Johnny Schroepfer | Critical Mass Chicago
Mobile and emerging technology have historically had more hype than actual adoption or implementation within marketing campaigns; but with the proliferation of mobile devices and digitization, the mobile channel is slowly becoming a necessity rather than a novelty. In this post, I wanted to address key developmental areas of mobile and their impact on customer experience and engagement.
Traditional & Mobile Integration in Marketing
From an integrative marketing standpoint, the mobile device can be seen as an extension of the brand experience; it’s what connects the end user with the brand messaging. Mobile is often an overlooked or undervalued channel of communication but in reality, it’s one of the most personal forms of communication in this digital world. When campaigns are successfully crafted and executed, the channel that connects the end user with the message has the power to change both brand perception and consumer behavior. With that said I believe we will continue to see more brands create mobile campaigns or initiatives that complement traditional marketing channels while allocating a significant amount of their advertising budget towards mobile and emerging technologies.
Advertising
The recent launch of the Apple iAd platform will only further prove my point that there will continue to be a major marketing shift and emphasis on mobile within integrated marketing campaigns. The iAd platform allows developers to create beautiful and rich advertising executions that are less disruptive and reach the consumer at the intersection of emotion and interactivity. In addition to this innovative approach, the developers will retain 60% of revenues which have already shown signs of success. Obviously, these signs of success are due more to novelty rather than active engagement and interest, but the iAd platform is definitely a step in the right direction for advertisers.
Payment
Mobile commerce is another key area of significant growth that is driving adoption and new users. With more brands integrating traditional and mobile campaigns, allowing consumers to easily pay for various products and services on-the-go will benefit both parties. Apples iTunes payment system is a great example of quick, convenient one-click purchasing. During the D8 conference, eBay CEO, John Donahoe, discussed the adoption of the mobile device as a way to pay for goods and services. Donahoe explained that the mobile delivered $600M last year and will deliver $1.5B to $2.0B in revenue to eBay this year.
Lauren Ysseldyke | Critical Mass Chicago
Being new to CM and the Experience Distribution team, I was thrilled to have the opportunity to attend Digg’s Social News & Social Marketing Summit and meet the mastermind behind Digg.com, Kevin Rose (@kevinrose). While listening to Kevin talk about Digg’s place in the social space, its upcoming new Digg platform (to be released in a month or so) and marketing concepts in a constantly changing social media world, I realized how extremely important it is today for marketers to know how to find a role in social media. With today’s audience immersed in a “snack culture” (as Kevin put it) of wanting online content in short, interactive form, marketers must learn to cater to these needs when it comes to advertising and building brands. Kevin has learned this concept well through his creation of Digg.com. Falling in a social space between Facebook and Twitter, Digg.com offers its “snack culture” audience a customizable news experience in which content is driven by the audience itself in a concise and interactive format.
“Snack c
ulture” wasn’t the only concept I found interesting and relevant to the CM team and other marketers today. After listening to marketing panelists, Daina Middleton, Sloan Broderick, Rick Wion and Chas Edwards, I took away several necessities to making it as a marketer in an increasingly digital and social media driven world. Here are my top five picks:
1. Role in Social Media: Before diving into the world of social media, it’s crucial for marketers and clients to talk about what each partner’s role should be for social media…Creative? Curator? Publisher? Sloan Broaderick (Managing Director, MediaCom) went into a great story about how Audi follows this concept and focuses on building brand relationships before people even enter the purchase stage. “If you’re just hearing about Audi when you’re ready to make a car purchase then we’re already too late,” Sloan says.
2. 3 Universal Categories of Digital Marketing: Daina Middleton (CEO, Performics) stressed the importance of dividing the digital marketing space into three categories of owned, earned and paid. Owned includes your own controlled assets (websites, commercials, videos); earned includes social and social monitoring and paid includes distribution. Then each of these channels/categories have a different purpose and a different set of goals/KPIs. This is very similar to how CM views the digital space and how the Experience Distribution team is structured. Whereas the rest of the CM company is dedicated to the owned category, the Experience Distribution team is divided into both an earned and a paid media group.
Molly Hop & Anna Mer | Critical Mass Chicago
It’s clear consumers are hungry for mobile applications, having downloaded more than 3 billion apps from the Apple app store as of March 2010, according to eMarketer. The growing popularity of this channel has led to an increased desire to find a way to market to our mobile consumers. In response to this, Apple has recently acquired Quattro Wireless (after having AdMob snatched up by Google) to create the iAd advertising platform that will launch with the iPhone 4G this summer. Now the question is, how will iAd change how brands approach marketing within mobile applications?
A common debate among the Critical Mass Experience Distribution team is whether there is a “correct approach” to mobile applications.
When do you recommend creating one?
What value will the mobile application serve vs. that of the mobile website?
How should we market this application?
How much money, time and effort should be put into it?
One might argue that building an application but not putting a marketing effort behind it is similar to the “if a tree falls in the forest but no one is there to hear it” concept. If we determine that we don’t have the money, resources or rationale to build and market our own application, do we sponsor a relevant existing app that another brand hasn’t gotten to first?
The launch of the iAd offers a new option. We will soon have the ability to build an experience as robust as an application and be able to syndicate it out as an ad within the application environment.
Let’s take a deeper look at what makes the iAd platform unique compared to other mobile platforms:
1. Dual Interaction
iAd allows users to interact with the rich media ad without losing the application that they had opened prior to engaging with the ad. This dual action was not possible before the launch of the iPhone 4G. Now consumers can click on ads with the reassurance that they will not lose what they were previously engaging with. This dual involvement will certainly lead to more mobile ad interaction.
2. More Robust
The ads that Apple is building for the mobile platform act more like applications or microsites than standard mobile advertisements. The ads are able to contain videos, games, content, images, etc. Users are able to expand the ads over any application, allowing the ad to take full screen. (Check out Jobs’ demo.)
