The Revlog

Chris Bourke, Mobext (Havas Digital)

I attended a mobile marketing & advertising conference last week at the headquarters of one of the UK's big four mobile operators; it was an international conference aimed at educating global staff on the benefits and potential growth of mobile media. And a great day it was too, peppered with the usual heated debates between agencies, clients and media owners.

But what was most interesting for me - and what I want to talk about today - is the view of the 'traditional' digital agencies with respect to mobile’s future, its application and how it should be used today. I have the greatest respect for the I-Level’s and Profero’s et al of the digital advertising world and count many of their managers and staff as close associates but their views about mobile on the day were just plain wrong.

They suggested that the mobile advertising industry is heading in the wrong direction trying to replicate Web advertising models on mobile. They also claimed that mobile advertising will be a tiny industry and that the focus today should be on mobile widgets.

I can see where the influences for these claims originate. Web banners have run their natural life cycle and now appear juvenile in sophistication. Moreover, their rapidly declining effectiveness means that web agencies are drawn to richer, more interactive media with engagement capability such as Eye Blaster MPU’s or widgets. But turn the clock back ten years and these same agencies were adamant that simple animated - even static - banners had a crucial role to play in advertisers marketing communication strategies. They seem to have forgotten this however. Mobile may seem to be out of synch with PC Web ad-delivery technology (eye blaster mobile just doesn’t exist yet) but coming to the party late is no justification for dismissal of mobile media - it simply needs to play catch up. And catch up it will. Every year in the UK alone some 5m new mobile handsets are given at Christmas, typically to lucky Gen-Y recipients. This serves as a flushing through of old technology and ushers in new mobile platforms that make mobile advertising richer, more dynamic and more engaging year-on-year. 2009 will be the year of mobile Flash, and what Gen-Y do, we all eventually do.

Perhaps it seems that I am suggesting that we should replicate web advertising wholesale on mobile; no, I have always argued that new models will develop that we have not yet conceived. Our ongoing research with Millward Brown is beginning to help us get a glimpse into the future and it seems that most consumers want to get a text message when they click on a mobile banner. Why? Probably because they are ‘on-the-go’ and want to look at the offer at their leisure when they have more time on the bus, train or at home. If the mobile operators offered such a model it would be efficient, targeted and highly economical.

But I can’t ignore that there is space - very valuable space - on mobile WAP sites and portals, and history tells us that where there is media space is usually gets filled. Mobile is no different.

Let’s look at the remaining claims that mobile will command a small percentage of the advertising budget and that widgets are the best way forward for advertisers testing mobile today. Regular readers of this blog will know that I believe Mobile will be transformational. I am a firm believer in Mary Meeker’s view (Internet Analyst at Morgan Stanley) that mobile represents a new computing cycle "Mainframe -> Minicomputer -> PC -> PC Internet -> Mobile Internet" and that "“The mobile will do to the PC, what the PC did to the mainframe”. Very few can see it yet but mobile will represent a quantum leap in media consumption patterns and advertisers will have to adjust. When this happens, the dollars, and pounds and euros - will follow.

I'm a big fan of widgets - use them all the time on the web - but to say that this is where advertisers should invest their hard earned pounds on mobile is misguided. It also misses the point that PC web and mobile web are - in terms of ad delivery technology - out of sync. Widgets on mobile handsets don’t generally work for two good reasons 1) They are expensive to download because of mobile operator fees 2) Consumer fear with regards to installing an 'application' on their handset. Last year there was a rash of TV ads for car manufacturers promoting a short-code that allowed consumers to download Java widgets; don’t see many this year? It's because the download rates are so poor so many car manufacturers have pulled J2ME (mobile widget) downloads. It’s just too damn soon for mobile widgets - the delivery structure, billing issues and consumer fear all combine to make them a poor first line choice for advertisers. What is the right first line choice? We'll visit that next week.

I know that mobile will play an integrated role in advertisers comms strategies – it won’t stand alone. But the comments from the traditional agencies at last weeks conference made me think that perhaps mobile agencies will do to the digital agencies what they did to the above-the-line agencies?!! :-)