Mobile Net Hamstrung
The Age
Tuesday March 4, 2008
Mobile internet will only take off when advertisers, their agencies and technology providers figure out how to maximise ad inventory across all three screens, according to one of the biggest industry players.
"I see that as the next problem that needs to be solved," said Jason Bigler, DoubleClick vice-president for product management, on a brief visit to Australia.Ad-serving companies like DoubleClick supply advertising content to web pages and to mobile properties on behalf of clients and media placement agencies. In some cases, the same content is used on both media but is served separately and there is no effectiveness tracking mechanism common to the platforms. Add television to the equation, and campaign measurement proves even more segmented."I believe that in three to five years we are going to see three-screen advertising - that's the mobile, the PC and the TV - in some unified way. From a technological point of view the only thing for that vision to be realised is a unified tracking mechanism," Mr Bigler said."On the internet we have cookies, on the mobile there's nothing. On digital TV, the maximum we have is a set-top box."Mr Bigler said mobile phone numbers may be one identifier that may allow a unified tracking tool over three screens."But do people really want their number linked to their set-top box?" he asked.Publishers keen to sell advertising space across all their digital properties - be they online, on mobile or television - will eventually force technology companies to come up with a solution. This should allow a video file, for example, to be rolled out to web, mobile and TV campaigns and be tracked according to reach, frequency, time spent watching and click through rates from a single server. The proposition would excite media buyers because for the first time, a campaign could be measured according the exposure single users receive - measured simultaneously through their IP address, mobile phone number and pay TV subscription."The most time-consuming part is the content development and repurposing it for the different screens, but (the practice) will become more common."However, the problem is complicated by the closed nature of the telecommunications industry which controls the mobile internet platform, he said."Culturally, the internet was much easier to tackle because of this idea of openness, but telcos protect their users. It is completely different." One publisher in Australia is already finding a way to serve up advertisements to its web and mobile platforms at once.Telstra Bigpond, in conjunction with sister company Sensis, has introduced an adapter to its ad-serving engine that allows the same content to be supplied to different properties across the stable with a single command. It helps that the publisher is also a carrier and can control what ads are served to its own customers.Google-owned DoubleClick sees the mobile platform as its next growth opportunity especially in Australia, a market seen as more mature than the United States."The buzzword of conversion of advertising is something the advertising and publishing industries are talking about. Whether consumers will buy in is not clear yet," he said.
© 2008 The Age
