Mobile has generated buzz lately as a rapidly growing tool for holiday shopping. But an annual survey by marketing services provider Epsilon suggests most people still aren’t crazy about getting messages on their mobile devices. The company’s Channel Preference 2012 report found, for instance, that 80% of U.S. consumers surveyed are not yet interested in receiving location-based mobile offers during or after a visit to a brick-and-mortar store. Mobile users, however, were more likely to be open to receiving messages via digital means than non-users. Consumers overall continue to favor direct mail over e-mail and company Web sites as communication methods. A majority surveyed again reported getting an emotional lift from postal mail, with 62% of Americans saying they enjoy checking their mailbox. “It comes down to trustworthiness,” said Warren Storey, SVP of product marketing and insights, at Epsilon, the marketing services division of Alliance Data Systems. “Direct mail is still above lots of other addressable media." For example, direct mail had 18% trustworthiness versus email, at 11%. Almost three-quarters (73%) said they get a lot of emails they don’t open, and 67% said they get too many emails in a day. The study also examined attitudes toward emerging marketing efforts across SoLoMo (social, location, mobile). It found that people are not quite ready to embrace location marketing in relation to receiving offers on their smartphones during or after a visit to a retailer. However, Epsilon found that 40% to 50% of U.S. and Canadian smartphone and/or e-book readers were likely to prefer digital channels than non-device owners. Furthermore, U.S. tablet users like the convenience of their devices and were 50% to 60% more likely to prefer getting marketing information via email and the Internet than those without smartphones or e-readers. When it comes to marketing in social media, a trust gap remains. Sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are rated as the least trustworthy sources -- each at less than 10%. In addition, consumers showed little interest in receiving offline information and offers from brands they have “Liked” on social sites, at 17% in the U.S. “What the industry is seeing is a big move toward online media,” he said. “It's a much smaller channel than most of the traditional addressable media channels, but it’s growing at a much faster pace.” To help keep up, Epsilon parent Alliance Data earlier this month acquired digital marketing agency Hyper Marketing for $460 million. The Epsilon findings were based on completed surveys from 1,991 U.S. consumers and 3,816 Canadian consumers conducted in June.
News Corp.’s planned shutdown of The Daily underscores the challenge of selling mobile news subscriptions for even the most ambitious and well-funded ventures. In explaining the demise of the iPad newspaper, News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch said simply that it didn’t attract a large enough audience to support the business model. With a stated goal of signing up “millions” of subscriptions when it launched almost two years ago, The Daily had only attracted some 100,000 as of July. The disappointing level of sign-ups, at as little as 99 cents a week, led to layoffs later in the summer and ultimately, to Monday’s announcement. New data released today by mobile ad company Mojiva shows what The Daily was up against by betting on a paid model. When asked whether they would pay a subscription to access their favorite news source, 59% of U.S. tablet users and 69% of those in the U.K. said “No.” In the U.S., a quarter of tablet users said they already pay for a new subscription, and 16% said they would, but don’t. Separate research from the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism in October was even less encouraging about tablet subscriptions. It found that only 6% of consumers said they had ever paid for news on their tablet compared to 14% in 2011. At the same time, nearly a fifth (19%) of mobile news consumers (on tablet and/or smartphone) had paid for a digital subscription in the last year. “There’s the challenge of creating a new brand, of being known by enough people,” noted Amy Mitchell, acting director of Pew’s Project for Excellence in Journalism, in relation to The Daily. “It’s not easy to have a mass audience of any kind today.” The new Mojiva study, based on surveys of 1,000 smartphone and tablet users each in the U.S. and the U.K in September, indicate that there is a growing appetite for getting news on mobile devices. Seventy percent of U.S. tablet users check two or more news sites or apps daily, along with 61% of their U.K. counterparts. Nearly a quarter (24%) of U.S. smartphone users get their primary updates from their phone or tablet, and 30% learn about breaking news stories via text alerts or notifications on one of their mobile devices. That compares to 25% who rely primarily on TV for breaking news. The company asked people what factor(s) would make them pay more attention to ads. For U.S. smartphone users, relevance (25%), humor (19%), and information of interest (15%). Tablet users pointed to the same factors. When it came to garnering attention on a mobile news site or app, two-thirds (67%) of U.S. smartphone owners, 54% of U.S. tablet users, and 65% of U.K. tablet users said they would be more mindful of a mobile ad if the ad content was relevant to the adjacent news story.
Consumers now spend a full 30% of their mobile time on social media networks, according to new data from Nielsen and NM Incite. Limited to their personal computers, consumers still spend close to 20% of their online time on social media -- more time than they devote to any other online activity. Across PCs and mobile devices, the total time that U.S. consumers spent on social media increased 37% to 121 billion minutes in July 2012 -- compared to 88 billion in July of 2011. The research partners attributed the strong social media numbers to a recent proliferation of mobile devices and connectivity. While the computer remains the predominant device for social media access, consumers’ time spent with social media on mobile apps and the mobile Web has increased 63% year-over-year. Facebook remains the most-visited social network, with some 152.2 million visitors via personal computer; 78.4 million via mobile app; and 74.3 million via the mobile Web. The site is also the top U.S. Web brand in terms of time spent, as some 17% of time spent online via personal computer is on Facebook, according to Nielsen and NM Incite. While Facebook and Twitter continue to be among the most popular social networks, Pinterest emerged as one of the breakout stars in social media for 2012.
Adelphic Mobile, a start-up founded by former key players of Quattro and Apple’s iAd that is trying to develop a powerful and easy-to-use platform for advertisers and agencies to target mobile ads to consumers, this morning announced a $10 million round of funding led by Google Ventures. Original Adelphic investor Matrix Partners also participated in the round. As part of the investment, Google Ventures’ Rich Miner has joined the Adelphic board. Adelphic said the funding would be used to accelerate its product development, including a real-time platform capable of analyzing up to 30 different signals necessary to define mobile audiences, a bounty of information that has so far proved vexing for mobile advertising and audience-targeting developers. Miner, a general partner at Google Ventures and a co-founder of Google’s Android operating system, said the investment is purely a venture capital role and does not signal a strategic role by Google itself. He said Google Ventures operates as an independent VC and that he was attracted to Adelphic because of three things: The experience and reputation of its founders, the prospects for the technology they have developed and the potential size of the mobile advertising marketplace, should someone figure out a way to organize it. Aside from the infusion of working capital and the vote of confidence from having Google Ventures’ name attached to it, Miner said he would be a very active board member and would work to leverage the connections and strategic insights he has gained from related ventures to help accelerate Adelphic’s growth.
It looks to be a green Christmas for consumer electronics makers and sellers, with U.S. consumers planning to spend 33% more on devices and gadgets than they spent last holiday season. According to a survey of 2,500 U.S. households, average spending on consumer electronics will be $1,058 this year -- up from $793 spent last year, according to Parks Associates. Among the respondents, nearly two-thirds (63%) planned to make a CE purchase this holiday season, almost double the percentage that said they planned to make them last year (37%). The hottest items: tablets and smartphones. “It’s certainly an encouraging sign that you’ve got so many people planning to buy consumer electronics,” John Barrett, director, consumer analytics at Parks Associates, tells Marketing Daily. “Overall, the consumer confidence index isn’t so robust. But in the CE space, things are picking up.” Among all consumers, 26% said they intend to spend more on electronics -- the highest rate since 2008, Barrett says. And for the first time, more U.S. households plan to purchase a tablet than a laptop, netbook or Ultrabook computer, he says. It’s still too early to call the demise of the desktop computer, Barrett says, but the early signs point to consumer attraction of the portability of laptops and tablets as their main computing devices. “There are early indications that we’re starting to see a shift to where instead of a household having a combination of desktops and laptops, we’re transitioning to a combination of laptops and tablets,” Barrett says. “There are some indications that desktops are [being viewed as] more expendable, and that a tablet is a nice way to complement a laptop computer.” In addition, consumers are showing stronger intentions to purchase their devices online (47% of tablet shoppers said they’d purchase online, compared with 35% last year). While this may mean increased showrooming and price comparisons in stores, consumers are also showing a preference for the online storefronts of traditional brick-and-mortar retailers. “There’s certainly a showrooming phenomenon going on,” Barrett says. “But the retail chains still play an important role. I think [their role] may be shifting though, as more of the buying goes online. Is the store just a distribution point, or is it a showroom? And yes -- you can pick up [a product there], but it serves a more interactive and informative role. It will be interesting to see how that phenomenon plays out.”
Car batteries get no respect. They are kind of like kidneys: you don't think about them until they stop working. Sure -- mileage, tires, motor oil, fun features, cosmetics and the transmission are important. But the works are just dead metal if the electricity stops. "Yes, there's a group of consumers who really are loyal to certain [battery] brands," says Tyler Reeves, director of marketing, strategy and innovation at Dallas-based Interstate Batteries. "But what you really need are very timely solutions in semi-emergency situations. Because you don't think about a battery until it dies." To get to the heart of it, the company is launching a campaign, via Dallas-based Firehouse, whose strategy is to outflank competitors DieHard, Exide and Duralast that have a retail distribution at places like Walmart. Interstate Batteries are sold almost exclusively in garages or general automotive repair shops, so the consumer exposure is limited -- and such operations are not typically open in the early morning, evenings or weekends, when people have problems. Thus, the idea is to get the Interstate batteries (and therefore the brand) to people when they really need a new battery. The effort, 866-RESCUE-ME -- initially in Columbia, S.C. and Omaha, Neb., before rolling out nationwide -- gives people dialing in over-the-phone help, a connection to one of the company's 80,000 dealer partners (or independent repair shops), or free on-site battery installation. "We kept looking at data that showed the majority of batteries were purchased in these emergency/semi-emergency situations," says Reeves. "We’re always looking for ways to make our brand promise come to life in a meaningful way to consumers. 866-Rescue-Me delivers on both fronts." The effort includes a radio, TV, digital, out-of-home, mobile and search campaign. In addition to getting the number from ads, consumers can click a mobile digital ad, which delivers the 866-RESCUE-ME number to their phone contacts. "Our brand is built on the promise of outrageously great service one battery at a time. The rescue program is an extension of this," says Reeves. "We are nationwide with good awareness among shops but from a consumer standpoint, not as well known, so we have opportunities." He tells Marketing Daily that the approach is a new one for the brand. "It's one thing to drive awareness with ads. This is different in that it shifts from awareness to solution. It also gives us measurable data: we will be able to see is call volume and lift in markets." He adds that when the number goes nationwide, it will be a benefit from a business standpoint. "We have 80,000 locations that sell Interstate, but until this there was not one number you could call. We wanted to amplify that." The humorous ad has a guy stranded in a parking lot that suddenly becomes the ocean, with his car floating around on an inflatable raft, and sharks circling.
Don't look now, but that “podcasting” medium that has been in a persistent state of becoming for the last six or seven years may actually be making its big move as the format evolves into something closer to “mobilecasting.” “It's been a real bump,” says Andy Bowers, executive producer of Slate.com's podcasts and video, of the 25% to 35% increase in downloads that he and others in that realm have seen this year -- especially since Apple introduced a dedicated podcast app in iOS. Now iPhone, iPad and iPod users are genuinely untethered and can access these on-demand audio and video shows without painful PC syncs. The popular podcast aggregator Stitcher has also been part of a general realization that podcasts are great audio content that can be pushed effortlessly to a device library. “That seems to have floated everyone’s boat,” says Bowers. And at Slate, which has a long-running portfolio of political, cultural and sports podcasts, it means that podcasting is also more of a real business now. The brand has over 1.5 million downloads a month. In fact, MediaPost’s own columnist Bob Garfield co-hosts one of the latest Slate shows about all things language-oriented: Lexicon Valley. And according to Slate Publisher Matt Turck, he is sold out of the inventory for his shows. “The CPMs for podcasts are the strongest we have -- better than pre-roll and even than some unique ad units.” Slate packages the podcasts in a number of ways, including as parts of display and video buys on the site as well as with event sponsorships when Slate’s well-known “Gabfest” teams of political and cultural commentators go live. TIAA-CREF underwrote a series of such live shows around the country this year. Fedex sponsored a series of podcasts on negation tactics that Turck says rushed to the top of the Business podcast charts. Interestingly, the sponsors who buy podcasts as a stand-alone vehicle tend to be direct-marketing efforts like Audible, GoToMeeting and Stamps.com. This is made all the more curious by the fact that podcasts don’t have clickthroughs. In an audio show, the best the direct marketer can hope for is to have the listener directed to a unique URL to attribute the lead to their Slate buy. Which listeners do, apparently. “They wouldn’t be coming back to us month in and month out if this wasn't working,” says Turck. He attributes the direct marketing success to the engaging, conversational model of having hosts incorporate the brand into the podcast chatter. Each show is limited to one or two sponsors, who get an intro mention from Bowers and then usually some kind of promotion that one of the editor/speakers on the podcast helps craft. Bowers says the hosts get into the challenge of making these spots feel less spot-like. They do research and get to improvise ways of connecting the segregated interstitial with the program it interrupts. The promise of podcasting as a compelling medium has always been limited by kludgy distribution. No matter how hard I tried to evangelize this medium among friends and family who I knew in my heart would love some of this content, the process of subscribing, downloading, syncing and erasing old content was simply too much content management for many. Making the distribution more wireless and better baked into the OS clearly helps move podcasting towards its essence -- time shifted radio. But it is a bit more than that, really. It is closer to time-shifted radio with satellite or HD radio content targeting. Podcasting allows highly specialized audiences and publishers to find their niche. There is some guy in his den in the Midwest recording a podcast on archived comics I listen to every week. It doesn’t have to be polished, because it is so well targeted to my own freakish obsession with the American comics arts that I eat it up. I didn’t even know his two sponsors existed until I happened to find his podcast. Now I visit them regularly. My guess is that podcasting never does achieve a massive scale, and that may be for the best. Podcasting was always about narrowcasting, but doing so with the emotionally engaging element of voice. Arguably, it is a more natural medium for smartphones than the Web. It doesn’t make you break stride and look at a screen, type or tap a thing. Podcasting may be the true native ad format for smartphones. It echoes the device’s most core functionality -- conversation.
Alternative screens allowing consumers to search and find information will become more prevalent in 2013. Screens at gas pumps and in the grocery store checkout line are two examples of the digital out-of-home (DOOH) market missing opportunities to capture consumers through search. Outcast Media, which supports a TV network at the gas pump, calls these consumers "ungettables." Ungettables, defined as consumers difficult to reach through traditional media channels, are 44% more likely than most to watch online video and stream content from their smartphones. The market segment tends to resist TV commercials, bypasses online ads, shops through smartphones, gets news from late-night shows and Web sites -- and according to Nielsen Media Research, fuels up at the gas pump at least once a week. This demographic spends $18 billion dollars annually within four hours of filling up at the pump, according to Outcast, which cites these numbers from the MasterCard Advisory Group. Consumers become a captive audience at the pump, supported by technology and touchscreens, especially those not who are not fidgeting with their smartphones while filling their car's gas tank. With the rise of technologies such as near field communication, some experts believe DOOH networks will outpace the Digital Place Advertising Association's DOOH 11.8% growth first-half 2012 figures. All of Outcast's 15,000 gas pumps are compatible with NFC technology that can identify consumers from a tap from a credit card, supporting cross-screen ad targeting. The company supports content partnerships with Fox, The Weather Channel and Comedy Central. On Monday ZenithOptimedia released estimates for billboards and other OOH advertising, such as place-based media and experiential media. The agency said the sector would grow 4.3% in 2012 and 5.0% annually during the subsequent three years. Putting it into perspective, digital billboards still only make up 3.0% of the total number of billboards in the U.S., according to ZenithOptimedia, which predicts paid-search spend will grow 15% in 2012, 14.0% in 2013, 13.0% in 2014, and 12.0% in 2015. Join us at the MediaPost Search Insider Summit in Park City, Utah on Dec. 14, and discuss search on alternative screens.