KEY POINTS:
Having spent most of last week in Barcelona at the Mobile World Congress where mobile advertising was one of the hot topics of discussion, it has been interesting catching up on news of a local deal designed to bring the first real mobile advertising to Vodafone mobiles.
Snakk Media, an offshoot of fast-growing Auckland mobile marketing specialist The Hyperfactory has done an exclusive deal to offer companies mobile advertising on 021 phones.
The Hyperfactory is run by the young entrepreneurs Geoffrey and Derek Handley who have built an impressive global business providing mobile, WAP, web-based ad and branding campaigns to clients particularly in Asia and the US.
More recently the Handleys have brought 42 Below founder Geoff Ross on board as a director as well as Rich Frank, an entertainment executive and veteran of Hollywood who helps run The Firm, a talent agency working with some major stars.
It is early days for mobile advertising everywhere, particularly in New Zealand where we are behind the ball when it comes to mobile data use on the phone - the high cost of surfing the mobile internet is enough to keep most people away from the web browser on their mobile.
But it appears as though the Snakk deal will offer a platform for companies to advertise on Vodafone Live, the mobile giant's gateway to free and premium mobile content services which gets a reasonable amount of use.
I haven't seen examples of what form the mobile advertising will take but as this story indicates consumers will only tolerate ads on their phones if they get something free in return.
It may be free calling, SMS messages or access to online services. Myspace, Nokia, Yahoo and Google among many others had mobile advertising platforms on show in Barcelona incorporating a range of business models.
Which method of serving up ads prevails is far from clear. Google for instance is intent on extending search engine advertising to the mobile in a meaningful way, one of the motivations for developing the Android operating system.
Frankly I think mobile advertising offers an opportunity to subsidise services consumers would otherwise be reluctant to use on their mobiles. Maybe you get a free song download if you watch a Flash animated advert first. Or you could access news stories for free if you click through a banner ad on the way to the news service.
TVNZ is planning free streaming of its OnDemand shows to mobile users, something that will be supported by advertising. Ill happily watch an ad before receiving some compelling mobile content or put up with some unintrusive advertising alongside dearch results.
But the mobile is a delicate platform - the ads have to be presented in a way that doesn't alienate subscribers who are only starting to get to grips with data services.
Still, mobile data services have been hamstrung here by the cost of accessing them. If advertising can partially or totally support the cost of delivering web services on the mobile and deliver a decent experience I think most kiwis will respond favourably.
What do you think? How much advertising will you tolerate beimg targeted at you via your mobile? Would you use the internet on your phone more if it was free but you were required to view adverts before accessing it?
