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All in one!

Janani Krishnaswamy

Anything from texting to TV, navigation to networking, mobile phones are doing so many jobs that they’re emerging as an all-in-one device. Over 300 million subscribers in India have access to mobility, making mobile phones the single largestdurable in the country. This makes it a powerful gateway for the future, says a recent Nokia study. The mobile phone is considered one of the mass media, the most intelligent and interactive among all mass media. Marketers are now capitalising on this strength.

Did you know that every time you download a new application on your iPhone, someone is spying on you? Marketers who watch your applications downloads over a period of time actually arrive at a conclusion about what kind of person you are, which sport you like most and even judge whether you are a green enthusiast or not. The mobile has the tremendous ability to deliver the most contextual message to the ideal person. Marketing experts believe it could define the future of advertising as it holds immense promise for targeted marketing and advertising. It is also very personal and is offered at a significant cost.

Manoj Dawane, CEO, People Infocom, says, “Mobile advertising is directed straight to the target customer and one can measure the response almost real-time. We foresee the percentage share of advertising spends on the mobile medium growing substantially over the next few years.”

The differentiating factor is the opportunity to reach consumers one-on-one in a way that has never existed before. PCs and TV sets are shared family devices, so advertising delivered to those devices is shared. But the mobile phone is a device that with very few exceptions is owned by one person. There’s a flipside to it too, though. Mobile marketers say determining the level of personal communications in a given individual’s comfort zone gets tougher. And the level of personalisation has to be right, as each consumer would have a different relationship with the brand. Mobiles can drive consumer action, deliver news or build consumer relationships. These can be executed through SMS/MMS, mobile search, push messaging, proximity marketing through Bluetooth (also referred to as BlueCasting), advergaming (in-game advertising) and several downloadable applications. Raj Narain, Managing Director, Optima Marketing Solutions, says, “The true potential of mobile advertising campaigns has not been fully explored and understood yet.”

If you were one of those with Bluetooth-enabled phones attending the cricket matches at Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore during the Indian Premier League in 2008, you would have also been prey to marketers trying to promote IPL. TELiBrahma, a Bangalore-based mobile solutions company, deployed a Bluetooth software - Cricket@ksca - and sent all Bluetooth-on phones information about the players of the two teams, details about the stadium, flash news when a player hit a century and even at the fall of a wicket. This is considered one of the most exciting case studies of BlueCasting. This was the most ideal form of marketing considering the context, as every cricket enthusiast in the stadium was more than willing to receive such information. But does it hold good for all brands and all places? To this, Suresh Narasimha, CEO, TELiBrahma, says, “Over the past one year, we have covered about 90 brands in 13 cities in more than 10 retail chains. That says it all.”

Says Suresh: “What we do is to convert malls into ‘Blu-fi’ zones, partner with media houses, create hoarding and other media ambience and educate the public about what’s available where. We try to offer location-based services, we give you all the information you missed getting through another medium, and we also try to play the role of your mall guide when you are lost in thought about where to turn next.”

But, the very thought of a departmental store being able to ping someone it recognised in the vicinity is causing concern. Though Nokia and Sony Ericsson have developed software patches, they have not been able to completely ward off ‘hacking brains.’ This might be one of the reasons why BlueCasting hasn’t made big inroads. “We are running a couple of campaigns trying to educate people and also ensure virus free zones,” adds Suresh of TELiBrahma.

Another issue is the infrastructure necessary for such proximity marketing to be seamless and successful.

But does the person walking down Emporio Mall actually want to receive a series of messages from the Tag Heuer, Christian Dior and Versace stores there all at the same time? What about privacy? Subhash Kamath, Managing Partner for BBH in India who is also ex-CEO, Bates 141, says brands have to ask themselves some crucial questions. “Are we intruding into our consumer’s space? Or, do we have our consumer’s permission to engage?” If the consumer has permitted the marketer to ping, then there is no problem. But if you intrude into a person’s life, then it can become an irritant. Especially when you look at the mobile being such a private and individual extension of a person’s individuality.” Suresh counters: “I don’t think people will see it as a major hindrance. We expect they’ll turn on their Bluetooth in such zones, only when they are willing to be engaged with ads,” he noted. Most marketers would agree with this. Therefore, if BlueCasting is not done in the most context-relevant place, it might even turn out as a marketing faux pas.

Invertising, which is currently popular abroad, might be the next big thing in India too. Subscribers will receive only those ads they prefer. Consequently, database segmentation will get more sophisticated as marketers begin to appreciate the true value of this medium. “However, this is not a totally new concept, it already exists in other media, it wouldn’t take us too long to apply it to the mobile,” says Praveen Sharma, Chief Operating Officer, Madison Plus.

Raj Narain of Optima says mobile marketing will gain currency over the next couple of years simply because online and mobile are the two media that facilitate response-based advertising and marketers will look to increase their share in advertising spends. With the advent of 3G, this process will be hastened.

The recent Nokia study reveals that consumers are increasingly embracing mobile Internet to explore and learn about new products and services. The study further indicates that 28 per cent of users surf mobile Web more than the traditional Web (26 per cent) and magazines (7 per cent).

Poonam Kaul, Director (Communications), Nokia India, says, “With the ability to reach such a mass audience in an environment that is not as cluttered as TV, print, or radio, mobile marketing will become a much greater part of a brand’s strategy.” She adds that Nokia Interactive Advertising is already working with hundreds of brands, including BMW, Unilever, Dolce & Gabbana, Ford, Vodafone, Kraft and HP Compaq, to deliver innovative mobile advertising campaigns. “This has helped brands reach out to a potential global audience of 3.3 billion consumers with mobile devices.”

Cellular News, a wireless telecoms online publisher that tracks the mobile market, recently published an article which talks about mobile advertising on social networking sites being a win-win proposition. Clever mobile social networks in the US even allow their members to choose the ads they want, making it possible for people to receive ads they find useful, as opposed to spam. A recent study by ABI Research also predicts that there will be 140 million users of mobile social networks by 2013. This reveals how many more people the mobile will be able to tap through the mobile Internet.

Mobile gaming, which until now has been seriously constrained by cost, is another type of content that advertisers can subsidise. Gamers are clearly willing to accept advertising as a trade-off for their entertainment. In-game advertising of various types also offers possibilities, though these are far more limited on the mobile screen than on the PC.

“Our own studies for network operators have proven that the incremental gains in brand awareness, brand interest and brand associations generated by in-game advertising are on a par with those produced by other media,” says Salil Bhargava, CEO, Jump Games, a publisher and developer of games across mobile platforms.

A study conducted by Jump Games reveals that it not only involves active consumer participation through reward system and scoring, it’s ten times more effective than a 30-second TV commercial. It has a comparatively longer attention span. There’s increased consumer lock-up and loyalty and games offer brands greater visibility due to longer shelf lives. Integration of brand slogan/jingle in the game adds to recall effectiveness.

On advergaming, Faisal Siddiqui, Head of India Operations, Motorola Mobile Devices, says, “The key question is how close does this bring the brand to the consumer. Also, this form of branded entertainment should not lose sight of the fact that it is entertaining the consumer. Having said that, we believe with more touchscreen mobile phones in the Indian market, advergaming will be an innovative mobile marketing option for brands.”

This is along the lines of sponsored advertising, says Debasis Chatterji, CEO, Netxcell. “In case of sponsored gaming the appropriate downloadable game may be sponsored by the advertiser in lieu of some sort of product/service advertising. Hence it will witness a northward trend.”

However, mobile marketers have not seen much evidence of its effectiveness yet. “We can’t really say at what pace advergaming will catch up,” says Praveen Sharma of Madison Plus.

‘Mobile-only’ campaigns haven’t caught on yet. Compatibility and GPRS/Bluetooth-enabled issues make it difficult. However, one of the latest optimisation models is called cross-media optimisation, a medium that reinforces value to another and thus has an overall impact.

“Mobile is gradually getting to the ‘one-man-show’ concept and advertisers are eventually opting for mobile advertising alone,” says Dawane of People Infocom.

Mauj, a People Infocom initiative, has a full service mobile marketing outfit that enables brand activation and promotion programmes on mobile, including applications and advertising.

“For example, if an advertiser wants to launch a campaign mirroring his traditional media plan onto the mobile medium, he will be able to choose across analogous channels like WAP for digital, Mobile TV for TV, IVR for Radio, and be able to measure the effectiveness of the campaign across these channels in real-time,” explains Dawane.

Advertising agencies are still exploring. Kamath of BBH says, “At this moment, different people may have allocated different budgets for it, depending on how much they’re willing to experiment and try out stuff. I don’t see any definitive trend yet.”

Praveen Sharma of Madison Plus says, “Mobile-only campaigns might be often used for lead generation activities, that is, when WAP is used as the only medium. We don’t see much activity yet in this ‘mobile only’ space.”

“There are millions of medium and small-scale enterprises that have never advertised. Considering the reach of the medium in rural and urban areas alike, mobile-only campaigns might be a good option for them because it’s the most cost-effective way of addressing the consumer personally,” says Sanjay Gupta, CMO, Airtel Mobile Services.

On the runaway success of the Airtel caller tune download, Gupta says Airtel is planning to optimally utilise the medium. “In the next few months, you’ll see Airtel ads first on the mobile before you see them on TV.”

On the global scene, Kamath says, there have been quite a few ideas involving the mobile. “In India, we have just started, but we are keenly looking at it across brands. The more we dabble in it, the better are the chances of finding a breakthrough. The key is not to look at it as a ‘medium’, but to explore it as a consumer’s way of life and what it means to him/ her. We’ve got to ‘live’ and ‘love’ digital, not just see it as a tool,” he adds.

The real obstacles are unfamiliarity and inhibition. Oddly, we’re all fairly digital in our lifestyles, whether it’s the mobile or Internet, chat or e-mail. We use it all the time and just can’t live without it. “But when it comes to generating digital ideas for brands, ad creators suddenly see it as some alien, gigantic, overpowering black hole,” says Kamath. Something that ‘digital specialists’ have to take on. “That’s because we’ve all grown up thinking print ads and television commercials only. And we find the new medium frightening. Overcoming that fear, to my mind, is the biggest challenge,” he adds.

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