Mobile Advertising

Introduction

Mobile advertising is a rapidly growing sector providing brands, agencies and marketers the opportunity to connect with consumers beyond traditional and digital media directly on their mobile phones.  This document is an overview on the mobile media channels available to advertisers today, including the benefits offered by each, and considerations to use in selecting and optimizing mobile advertising campaigns.

This document is adjunct to the Advertising Guidelines, which provide technical specifications, global formats, guidelines and best practices for each mobile channel.

Today, mobile phones can be utilized for much more than just making and receiving calls.  Besides voice services, mobile users have access to data services such Short Message Service (SMS), also known as text messaging, picture messaging, content downloads and the Mobile Web.  These media channels carry both

content and advertising.

The mobile phone is an extremely personal device.  One mobile phone typically has one unique user.  This makes the mobile phone a precisely targeted communication channel, where users are highly engaged with content.  As a result, the mobile channel delivers excellent campaign effectiveness and response

levels compared to other media.

Mobile is valuable as a stand-alone medium for advertising, but it’s also well suited for a vital role in fully integrated cross-media campaign plans, including TV, print, radio, outdoor, cinema, online and direct mail.  These examples illustrate the ways brands and marketers use the mobile channel to engage and interact

with consumers:

• Click to call (users place an outgoing call to the content provider or advertiser)

• Click to locate (users find, for example, the closest car dealer or movie theatre, enabled by location-based services)

• Click to order brochure (users receive marketing materials by supplying their postal addresses)

• Click to enter competition (users enter text or sweepstake to win prizes)

• Click to receive email (users receive an email and a link to online site by supplying their email address)

• Click to receive mobile coupon (users receive an electronic coupon on their mobile phone that can be redeemed immediately at a participating merchant)

• Click to buy (users make a purchase paid for with a credit card, added to their monthly mobile bill or using some other form of mobile payment)

• Click to download content (users download content, including logos, wallpapers or ring tones, onto their mobile phones)

• Click to enter branded Mobile Web site (users click a banner to get connected to standing or campaign-specific Mobile Web site)

• Click to forward content (users forward relevant content

to friends, creating a viral campaign effect)

• Click to video (users click a banner to view an advertiser’s commercial for a product or service)

• Click to vote (users reply message ballot or poll from their mobile phone and provide marketers and brands with valuable research insights)

When designing a mobile advertising campaign, there are multiple channels available to reach the consumer.  Those include Mobile Web sites, mobile applications, mobile messaging and mobile video, all of which can be integrated into the interactive campaigns previously described.  Each channel can link to additional mobile content or channels, as well as to complementing traditional media.  Mobile provides a powerful instant and

interactive response path, such as consumers sending a keyword to a short code via SMS, or registering on a Mobile Web site.

by mma glo

SWOT Case Study - Airtel

Strengths

• Bharti Airtel has more than 65 million customers (July 2008). It is the largest cellular provider in India, and also supplies broadband and telephone services - as well as many other telecommunications services to both domestic and corporate customers.

Other stakeholders in Bharti Airtel include Sony-Ericsson, Nokia - and Sing Tel, with whom they hold a strategic alliance. This means that the business has access to knowledge and technology from other parts of the telecommunications world.

The company has covered the entire Indian nation with its network. This has underpinned its large and rising customer base.

Weaknesses

• An often cited original weakness is that when the business was started by Sunil Bharti Mittal over 15 years ago, the business has little knowledge and experience of how a cellular telephone system actually worked. So the start-up business had to outsource to industry experts in the field.
• Until recently Airtel did not own its own towers, which was a particular strength of some of its competitors such as Hutchison Essar. Towers are important if your company wishes to provide wide coverage nationally.
• The fact that the Airtel has not pulled off a deal with South Africa's MTN could signal the lack of any real emerging market investment opportunity for the business once the Indian market has become mature.

Opportunities

• The company possesses a customized version of the Google search engine which will enhance broadband services to customers. The tie-up with Google can only enhance the Airtel brand, and also provides advertising opportunities in Indian for Google.
• Global telecommunications and new technology brands see Airtel as a key strategic player in the Indian market. The new iPhone will be launched in India via an Airtel distributorship. Another strategic partnership is held with BlackBerry Wireless Solutions.
• Despite being forced to outsource much of its technical operations in the early days, this allowed Airtel to work from its own blank sheet of paper, and to question industry approaches and practices - for example replacing the Revenue-Per-Customer model with a Revenue-Per-Minute model which is better suited to India, as the company moved into small and remote villages and towns.
• The company is investing in its operation in 120,000 to 160,000 small villages every year. It sees that less well-off consumers may only be able to afford a few tens of Rupees per call, and also so that the business benefits are scalable - using its 'Matchbox' strategy.
• Bharti Airtel is embarking on another joint venture with Vodafone Essar and Idea Cellular to create a new independent tower company called Indus Towers. This new business will control more than 60% of India's network towers. IPTV is another potential new service that could underpin the company's long-term strategy.

Threats

• Airtel and Vodafone seem to be having an on/off relationship. Vodafone which owned a 5.6% stake in the Airtel business sold it back to Airtel, and instead invested in its rival Hutchison Essar. Knowledge and technology previously available to Airtel now moves into the hands of one of its competitors.
• The quickly changing pace of the global telecommunications industry could tempt Airtel to go along the acquisition trail which may make it vulnerable if the world goes into recession. Perhaps this was an impact upon the decision not to proceed with talks about the potential purchase of South Africa's MTN in May 2008. This opened the door for talks between Reliance Communication's Anil Ambani and MTN, allowing a competing Inidan industrialist to invest in the new emerging African telecommunications market.
• Bharti Airtel could also be the target for the takeover vision of other global telecommunications players that wish to move into the Indian market.

by Mkt Teachers