Future of Mobile Advertising - Notes from Cannes Lions Ad Festival 2009

Mobile advertising was one of the important topics which were discussed at the 56th International Cannes Lions Advertising Festival. A number of executives representing big advertising and marketing firms around the world discussed the future of mobile marketing.

A lot of people who discussed the future of mobile phone advertising were of the opinion that it could become really big in the next two or three years. There are two reasons why they believe so.

1. The large number of mobile applications designed exclusively for smart phones which allow users to access multimedia content right from their mobile phones.

2. The ever-growing popularity of social networks like MySpace and Facebook which can be accessed right from the mobile phone thanks to mobile social networking.

Statistics show that mobile advertising has grown at an average of 45% in the last five years, which is incredible to say the least. In other words, what used to be a $3 billion industry has now become a whopping $30 billion industry in just about five years.

Let us now take a look at some of the most important points discussed.

1. A lot of executives said that they have launched a lot of mobile advertising campaigns in the recent past and the response so far has been pretty good.

2. Almost everyone was of the opinion that advertisers need to be more creative to generate interest among users. They were very clear that run of the mill ads which interrupt users every two minutes will definitely not work.

3. It was predicted that in the next three to five years, mobile marketing will account for nearly 10% of global media ad spending.

4. Highly targeted local mobile advertising campaigns will generate enormous amount of interest among small retailers. (Incidentally, this is something that I have repeatedly said in this blog. You can take a look at it here, here, here, and here.)

5. Emerging markets like Africa and Latin America hold a lot of promise as the number of mobile users has increased steadily in the past few years.

6. One of the biggest hurdles for advertisers around the world is the lack of compatibility between 3G networks in Asia and Europe.

7. 4G – the fourth generation high speed mobile technology – is something that advertising firms around the world are waiting for with bated breath. It is expected to hit the market in another ten years or so.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

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