Mobile advertising - South Africa remains on top

South Africa is one country which is light years ahead of other countries when it comes to mobile advertising. It is considered the hottest market right now and the numbers speak for themselves. The average response rate for mobile advertising campaigns in South Africa is anywhere from 10% to 25%, which is nothing short of amazing.

The latest success story, MXit, proves it once again. MXit is a mobile social networking site which is as popular as Facebook in South Africa. With a subscriber base of over 7 million, the company is a dream for mobile advertisers. A huge number of mobile advertisers are interested in working with MXit as the response rates are really high.

This is not just a one-off story. Mobile phone is considered the hottest advertising medium in South Africa today and it is predicted that mobile advertising will be worth way over R1.5 billion in the next three years.

In case you’re wondering how it’s possible, let me explain.

1. Mobile advertising is cost effective. It’s way cheaper than traditional advertising methods like TV, magazines, or radio. And it delivers tremendous results.

2. You can create a mobile advertising campaign and launch it within a week’s time. And you can see the results in a day or two. This is simply unimaginable in the case of traditional advertising.

3. Most importantly, South African mobile users are prolific when it comes to mobile web. A majority of mobile users use mobile internet very regularly and this helps mobile advertisers create interactive mobile advertising campaigns to reach out to them.

Already, South African students have mobile advertising as part of their syllabus, in case you don’t know. It can only mean one thing and that is the next generation will be even more receptive to mobile advertising. Interesting, don’t you think?

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising.

0 comments.

Friendster releases mobile site in Philippines

Friendster, the famous social networking site, has released its mobile site in the Philippines. If you are a Filipino, you’ll now be able to access Friendster right in your mobile phone.

The Philippines has long been Friendster’s territory. Such is the overwhelming popularity of the site that over 94% of internet users in Philippines have a Friendster account. So, after becoming the market leader in the country, it’s only a natural progression for Friendster to get into the mobile phone. Especially, with mobile social networking being the buzz word now, Friendster has decided to join the party to grab its market share.

If you are a member of Friendster, you’ll be able to access the site in your internet enabled mobile phone. However, if you are not a user, you cannot open an account in Friendster through your mobile phone. But Friendster authorities have said that they are working on it and soon people will be able to open an account via their mobile phone.

I think Friendster has made the right move at the right time. At a time when mobile social networking is on the rise, this move can be very fruitful for Friendster. Especially, its undisputed dominance in the Asian market will help it grab its market share in the mobile market also.

Categories: All things mobile phones, Mobile Social Networking.

1 comment.

Mobile social networking rapidly gaining popularity

Social networking is the in-thing now and it’s evident from the number of people who access MySpace and Facebook dutifully every day. In fact, people are so much into these sites that they want to be connected all the time. However, you can’t carry a laptop all the time and you can’t go to a browsing center ten times a day to update your status in your Facebook profile and to catch up with your friends. So, what do you do? Simple – you access these sites in your mobile phone.

The practice of accessing social networking sites on mobile phones, called mobile social networking, is becoming more and more popular with mobile users these days. The biggest reason is the iPhone. It literally changed the way people perceived mobile phones and now iPhone users top the chart in mobile internet usage.

According to statistics, more than 85% of iPhone users access the internet from their phones. This is an incredible number, to say the least. Smart phone users come second in this list. People, especially young ones, who have internet facility in their phone, access social networking sites regularly.

A report from Nielson says that 1.7% of all mobile users in the U.K. visited social networking sites on their cell phones regularly. It’s 1.6% in the U.S., 0.8% in Spain, 0.6% in Italy, and 0.2% in Germany. Experts predict that these numbers will more than double in about two years and mobile social networking will become popular big time.

MySpace, followed by Facebook, is the most accessed social networking site on mobile phones. In December 2007 alone, the site had close to 3 million visits from mobile users. In the U.S. and all over Europe, there are tens of thousands of regular mobile users who log into MySpace regularly. We’ve already seen how popular MySpace can be, but still these numbers are incredible.

I think these numbers will have a significant impact on mobile service prices in the coming days. Thanks to this overwhelming popularity of mobile social networking and other similar things, operators might be tempted to cut down the rates for data plans. One example for this would be Vodafone UK. In its latest monthly plans, it has added unlimited internet access as a standard feature. We might as well see other companies follow suit.

Categories: Apple iPhone, All things mobile phones, Mobile Social Networking.

0 comments.

Google releases mobile version of Orkut

In an attempt to make Orkut go places, Google has quietly released the mobile version of Orkut. From now on, you can access Orkut mobile any time you want, any where, right in your mobile phone. You can check out your Orkut profile, read scraps, write scraps, you can search for profiles, you can get updates from your pals, you can set reminders, and you can do a whole lot of things. However, there are a few things that I think will not go too well with the users.

First of all, you cannot access videos or communities. This, I think, is a major minus as far as the users are concerned. Second of all, you cannot create a new profile and you can’t even edit your current profile, which I think is another major minus.

Apart from these two downsides, Orkut mobile is really cool and you can check it out any time you want. But what surprises me most is that Google has not publicized it the way I thought it would. I mean, it’s such a famous social networking site and going mobile is such a big step forward and yet it doesn’t get that big a hype before the launch??? Beats me.

Categories: Google, All things mobile phones.

0 comments.