Mobile advertising in India will be a $100 million market soon

With over 270 million mobile users, India is considered probably the hottest mobile phone market in the world. With this being the case, mobile advertisers are trying to cash in on the opportunity, as expected. As we’ve already seen, Indian operators are excited about mobile advertising and they see it as a potential long term revenue generating model. So, it’s only a matter of time before mobile advertising takes off big time in India.

Industry experts have predicted that mobile phone advertising in India would be worth more than $100 million in just a few years from now. Considering the market is currently valued at a measly $1million, it looks like quite a prediction. But experts firmly believe that the Indian market has the potential to become one of the top players in the world as far as mobile advertising is concerned. However, there are a couple of issues which need to be addressed to make this happen.

First, the cost of mobile web should be brought down. Though data plans in India are pretty much affordable, mobile web is one area where they can bring down the cost furthermore to attract more users to use the mobile internet facility regularly.

Second, the issue of revenue sharing between advertisers and mobile operators is an area of concern. Right now, the ratio is 70:30 with 70% of the revenue going to mobile operators and 30% going to advertisers. Understandably, advertisers are not exactly happy with this disproportionate sharing and they want this ratio to be revised.

Experts say that if mobile operators and advertisers could address these issues, the market may reach the $100 million mark sooner than later.

I actually think the issues mentioned here are common for markets all over the world. Even in the U.S., not everyone with a web-enabled phone is enthusiastic about surfing the web regularly, as the data plans are pretty costly. And the issue of disproportionate revenue sharing is not unheard of either, as the spat between Verizon and Google is well known. So, it’s basically an inherent flaw in the system. Unless people address this issue, there will always be hurdles in the path.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

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A look at India – the fastest growing mobile phone market in the world

India has been the fastest growing mobile phone market in the world for quite some time now. There are already 250 million mobile phone users in India and the number gets increased by 6 million every month, thanks to new users. There are a few reasons behind this impressive growth.

1. Indian economy is on a roll and has had an impressive growth over the past few years. This has increased the purchasing power of the people significantly, especially that of the middle class people. As a result, the 30 million middle class people in India are the target customer segment for mobile companies now.

2. The price range of mobile phones is quite big. You can get low-end mobile phones in the $20 - $30 price range and at the same time you can get high-end mobile phones in the $600 - $800 price range. So, whether you belong to the super rich category, middle class, or lower middle class category, you can get a mobile phone which fits into your budget.

3. There are several major mobile operators in India and there is intense competition in the market. Almost all of them have slashed their call charges, text message charges, and offer a lot of value added services. What this means to the user is, not only can he get a handset at an affordable rate, but he can also afford to keep his phone charges within his budget every month. This has led to more and more people buying mobile phones.

Recent reports predict that India will have a whopping 500 million mobile users by 2010. This is the reason why mobile advertising is considered the next big thing in the Indian market.

Though mobile advertising by third party advertisers is yet to become popular, several mobile operators are already doing it successfully. Notable players like Bharti Airtel, BSNL, Tata Indicom, Reliance, and Vodafone regularly send text messages to their users regarding latest offers, new plans, and other issues.

That said, a few big players have already tried their hands on mobile advertising through third party advertisers and have had a good response. Recently, Hindustan Lever and Coca Cola launched mobile advertising campaigns promoting their products and have had good response rate so far. Since Indians are very active in using features like text message, MMS, and mobile internet, mobile advertisers have tons of choices to come up with personalized mobile advertising campaigns.

All in all, India will be a market to watch out for in the next few years as far as mobile advertising is concerned.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

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Yet another interesting report on mobile advertising - II

I recently read a brilliant report on mobile advertising by Arthur D Little, a leading management firm. It says that mobile broadband will gain significant popularity in the next five years and with Europe being the leader in mobile based services now, mobile broadband penetration in Europe will be the highest in the world, up to 50%.

The report also talks about the role of mobile operators in mobile advertising. I was surprised to read that advertising generates only 5% of mobile operators’ revenue whereas in other media, advertising plays a bigger role and constitutes around 16% of the total revenue. This clearly indicates that mobile operators are yet to understand the impact of advertising as a revenue generating model. However, with mobile market growing fast, they need to think of ways to tap the revenue that can be generated from advertising.

Internet kingpins like Google and Yahoo have realized the importance of mobile advertising and are working on making it a successful source of revenue. At this stage, mobile operators need to do something on their own to generate revenue through advertising or they need to at least form partnerships with big players like Google and Yahoo and share the revenue. Either way, there is money to be made in mobile advertising and whether you are an operator or an advertiser, you need to come up with an idea to get your share.

The report also talks about Blyk and takes it as a case study to describe how successful mobile advertising could be, if it’s done the right way.

I’ve always believed that mobile broadband has a great future and moreover, we are now at a stage where we are fed up with 3G networks and talking about WiMax as an alternative. So, the stage is set for mobile broadband to become the next big thing.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

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