Advertising in mobile games - A summary

This post is kinda like a summary. Of everything I’ve talked about advertising on mobile games so far. A couple of my friends asked me to explain mobile games, the concept of advertising in mobile games, how they do it, why they do it, and of course some official facts and figures to back up my claims. Though I’ve talked about mobile games and advertising in mobile games quite often in this blog, I thought it would be nice to summarize it in just one post to make it easier for my readers. So, here it goes.

If you were to rate some of the most favorite pastimes of mobile users, mobile video games would certainly be one of them. From kids to teenagers to adults, everyone likes to spend a little time on mobile games every now and then. And downloading a game to your mobile phone has become ever so easy thanks to mobile advertisers. You have ad funded mobile video games that are free to download and they are very popular among people now. In fact, media analyst Screen Digest predicts that by 2012, over 60 million mobile games will be downloaded per year. That’s a monstrous number which just goes to show the popularity of mobile video games.

There are two ways in which advertisers place their ads in mobile video games. First, ads are placed before and after a game. This is by far the most common form of advertising in mobile video games. You download a game and when you’re about to start playing it, you’ll be shown some ad spots. Then when you finish playing the game, you’ll be shown some more ad spots. This method works well with users as they are not disturbed during the course of the game. Also, advertisers tend to gain from this as there is no way these ads can go unnoticed.

Second method is called product placement. Now, this method is even more refined and the ads are blended seamlessly into the gaming environment. In this method, you’ll not find ads popping up before or after the game. Instead, you’ll find them placed within your game. The soccer players might be wearing Nike jerseys, the boxers might be wearing Adidas shoes, and the signboards might have Microsoft logos. This way, the brands are shown to us in a subtle way and it doesn’t distract our attention on the game at all. So, this method is also pretty popular with advertisers these days.

The mobile advertising industry is growing fast and ad funded mobile games have never been so popular. There are plenty of companies that offer free mobile games for download which are completely ad funded. Going by the popularity of these games, the prediction made by Screen Digest very much looks like a possibility in the next few years.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones, Mobile Games.

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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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A mobile based payment system soon to be launched in India

In just about a couple of months, mobile users in India will be able to use their mobile phone to pay for things, just as they use their credit card or debit card.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has stated in its annual policy statement that it will come up with the guidelines to formulate a payment system using mobile phones. RBI is discussing seriously with service providers, banks, and other financial institutions about this move and the guidelines are expected to be released on June 15th.

Already, mobile banking in India is gaining popularity big time with lots of big banks embracing this technology to make it easier for their customers. Prominent banks like ICICI, HDFC, and SBI offer mobile banking facility and ICICI has gone one step ahead and has started a mobile based service called mShop which allows you to shop using your mobile phone.

I think this is a great move by RBI. Mobile phone market in India is huge and a mobile based payment service makes complete sense at this stage. FYI, I had already blogged about a mobile based service in India where you can use your mobile phone as your airplane boarding pass. Things like this can really help people a lot and can make mobile phones more useful than what they are right now. Stay tuned for more updates on this issue.

Categories: All things mobile phones.

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Different types of mobile advertising

The fact that text message advertising is the most popular form of mobile advertising is something that everyone knows. However, mobile advertisers are trying their hands on different types of mobile advertising to reach their target customers more effectively. Three such types of mobile advertising are rapidly becoming famous with both mobile marketers and people. They are Bluetooth advertising, video ads, and barcodes or QR codes.

Bluetooth advertising is something I’ve talked about a lot of times in this blog. With more than 60% of mobile phones in North America sporting Bluetooth facility, advertising via Bluetooth is a no-brainer. You can download coupons, audio files, video files, and other things via Bluetooth and this has become very popular with mobile users of late. Not surprisingly, the response rate for such ads has been very impressive.

Video ads are something that is a part of mobile videos these days. Most carriers offer free mobile content in the form of videos funded by adverts. Instead of placing these ads before or after the video, advertisers these days try to intersperse these ads with the content in such a way that people don’t find it odd. Product placement is gaining popularity among mobile marketers these days and they are trying to add adverts to mobile videos in a manner the user won’t find annoying.

QR codes or Quick Response codes are becoming rapidly popular. All you need to do is, scan the code with your mobile camera. Immediately, you’ll get a text message with more details on the ad. It’s that simple. In Japan, like I already said, this technology is a rage and it’s now popular in Europe and parts of the U.S.A.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones.

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Mobile phone could decide the future of your website

For long, you’ve worried about traffic, pagerank, and all other stuff for your websites. You tried a thousand other things to drive traffic to your sites and unless you are Darren Rowse, you know it’s just damn difficult. But things are about to change just a little bit.

Guinness has an annual event, a very popular one, which takes place across the globe every year. It’s called Guinness Toast. It’s already a very popular one, but Guinness thought of trying mobile marketing to increase its popularity further. So, it told consumers all over the world that they can join the event through their mobile phone. On doing so, they will become a member of the program instantly and get a free Guinness ringtone. Needless to say, the news spread like wildfire. Most importantly, the traffic to the site thegreatguinnesstoast.com went up significantly.

Thanks to high-end mobile phones that offer good mobile browsing experience to people, the number of people who browse the internet through their mobile phone is increasing slowly and steadily. What this means to you is that if you have a mobile friendly version of your site, or, even better, a mobile site, your chances of connecting to your readers become significantly high.

In future, we might as well have blog gurus teaching us how to drive traffic to our mobile sites. Who knows? Even Google might come up with pagerank for mobile sites. Get ready.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, All things mobile phones, Mobile Web.

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