With mobile advertising and marketing budgets growing, agencies are scrambling to bolster in-house expertise to match client demand. In that respect, SapientNitro, AKQA, Ogilvy, TribalDDB and Razorfish lead the pack, according to the first Wave report from Forrester that ranks digital agencies by mobile capability. To qualify for the evaluation, Forrester required agencies to provide a comprehensive set of mobile marketing services, have at least five years of mobile experience, a strong and growing revenue stream from mobile marketing and appear frequently as a competitor for new business and on brands’ short lists. The ranking criteria also included the agencies’ methodologies for strategy development and program execution, their approaches to technology for measurement and analytics and the strength of their company vision for mobile. That process ultimately boiled down to nine leading U.S. vendors, which also included iCrossing, VML, Rosetta and Possible Worldwide, described as “strong performers” behind the top five. Overall, SapientNitro received the highest client scores on a scale of zero (weak) to five (strong) across roughly 12 metrics spanning their current services, strategy and market presence. “The agency challenges its clients to think creatively about mobile’s role in strategic development and has the execution chops to implement. SapientNitro also brings a very long-tenured and experienced mobile management team that is well positioned to bring to life its clear and forward-looking vision for mobile,” stated the Forrester report. Runner-up AKQA was cited as a strong choice for any brand “looking to make a big splash in mobile,” but the study said the agency could improve its marketing skills and tactics. Ogilvy was credited with having a detailed long-term plan for mobile expansion, but needs to balance its vision with greater focus on clients’ immediate needs. Similarly, the report gave TribalDDB high marks for expansive client relationships and the ability to integrate mobile with other strategic initiatives, but faulted its optimization efforts' post-campaign launch. Razorfish was dinged for being too expensive. “The clients we spoke with feel that Razorfish costs more than other agencies with comparable services. However, the agency has a very good client retention rate. So if cost is a concern, it’s not keeping the vast majority of its clients from maintaining the relationship,” stated the report. Rosetta was also viewed as pricier than competitors. Among others, iCrossing was noted for using its background in search to develop more detailed audience personas than other agencies and provide strong mobile analytics. VML earned the highest scores for collaboration, “making it a great choice for any brand that has a full agency roster and needs to add a mobile partner to the mix,” according to Forrester. While the top-ranked agencies had varying strengths and weaknesses, the study underscored certain common approaches to mobile. These include spreading mobile expertise across different departments or disciplines within agencies so mobile know-how isn’t siloed within one group. Likewise, the vast majority of mobile programs studied were part of a larger, integrated digital effort. Even where an agency is hired for just the mobile piece of a campaign, it must work with other agencies to ensure a consistent approach for engaging the customer. All the agencies also predict that mobile will eventually eclipse PC-based use and that the medium will become the key connection between online and offline worlds. That, in turn, will lead mobile strategies and technology to end up in everything from cars to cable boxes.
Visitors to CPG brand Web sites buy 37% more in retail stores than non-visitors to the brand sites. That’s according to a new study from Accenture, comScore and dunnhumbyUSA, which attempts to shed light on the link between marketers’ on- and offline efforts. “CPG marketers currently invest millions of dollars in their brand Web sites ...,” said comScore Vice President Mike Zeman. “Brand Web sites can attract and influence the behavior of the most valuable segments of any brand's franchise.” Yet as Zeman explains, brands can follow specific steps to strengthen the impact of their digital efforts on offline purchases. He says it is vital for sites to be "highly engaging if they are to attract a meaningful number of visitors." The benefits, he says, are tangible. Marketers that succeed "stand to gain an attractive return by growing their brands' sales in retail stores." For maximum impact, brands should update their online content regularly, making sure it contains value messaging that engages consumers while providing compelling reasons to purchase products at retail. The study found that visitors to CPG brand Web sites are valuable and frequent buyers of the brand in retail stores -- completing 41% more transactions than non-visitors. As a result, brand Web sites are able to attract heavier-than-average brand buyers. Web site visitors are also heavier buyers within a brand's product category -- spending 53% more category dollars than non-visitors, according to the research. “Since site visitors have higher affinity to the brand and the overall product category, there is an opportunity for brand marketers to drive loyalty through personalizing the Web site experience, catering to the preferences of their best customers," said John LaRocca, vice president of strategic partnerships at dunnhumbyUSA. The length of time that visitors spend on a brand's Web site was found to be a key determinant of their likelihood to buy the brand in retail stores. The study was based on an integrated panel of 1 million U.S. Internet users who gave comScore explicit permission to have their online activities continuously measured and matched to their in-store brand-buying behavior, provided by dunnhumbyUSA.
Russia's search engine Yandex said Monday it has purchased map licenses from Nokia subsidiary Navteq to develop detailed world maps for its Yandex.Maps service. The maps from Europe, North America, Australia and Asia will show city roads, urban traffic networks, streets and buildings. Using the Yandex.Maps API, Web site owners can embed maps of various countries on their sites. Yandex had purchased map data of Turkey from Navteq. Now it plans to add content to desktop and mobile applications that supports all major platforms. Changes point to declining market share for Yandex, as it tries to hold onto its market share in Russia. Since last summer, Yandex's search market share slipped from about 65% to 60% today, conceding to Google. The company managed to grab 26% of market share in Russia, up from 22%, according to Piper Jaffray, citing Liveinternet.ru. "In December, Yandex's share had stabilized slightly above 60%, but some have noted that Yandex appears to have lost some slight share through the holidays, touching 59.4% in the first week of January," Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster wrote in a research note, admitting that shares bounced back to roughly 60% in the following week. Munster believes this "slight blip" in share during the holidays was likely a seasonal change from reduced overall search volume and not necessarily a continuation of the share loss trend. The map data from Navteq should become the pedestal for mobile and local services. Last year, Yandex stepped up efforts to support mobile users. The search engine became the default for the Windows Phone operating system in Russia. Although Windows has a minor market share in Russia, Munster believes Microsoft will eventually make a significant push and gain some share globally. The search engine also acquired SPB Software, which has a solution for a mobile phone interface. The move could help Yandex compete better with Google's Android.
By all indications, mobile traffic and m-commerce made impressive gains during the holiday season as a growing number of people turned their handsets into personal shopping assistants. New research from the Pew American & Internet Life Project further highlights that trend, showing that more than half (52%) of adult cell phone owners used their devices while in a store to get help with purchasing decisions. Specifically, 38% used their phone to call a friend for advice while in a store, 24% looked up product reviews online in-store, and one-quarter checked pricing online to see if they could get a better deal elsewhere. Furthermore, one in five “mobile price-matchers” made their most recent purchase from an online store rather than a physical location. More than one-third (37%) decided not to buy the product at all, 35% bought it at that store and 8% got it at another store. That last finding should not do much to diminish retailers’ fears that shoppers are increasingly using their brick-and-mortar outlets as showrooms for subsequent purchases at an online or offline competitor. Breaking down the demographics of in-store mobile use, the Pew study found that cell owners ages 18-49 are much more likely to use their phones for online product reviews than cell owners ages 50+. The youngest segment of adults -- 18- to-29-year-olds -- were the most active group, with 63% using their phones either to call a friend for purchase advice or to look up product reviews in-store. As with other kinds of mobile behavior, ethnic minorities outpace whites when it comes to in-store mobile use. More than half (53%) of nonwhites called a friend for advice or looked up product reviews via mobile while shopping compared to 45% of whites. The difference between the two groups was especially pronounced when it came to looking up reviews -- with a third of non-whites doing this versus 21% of whites. Urban and suburban cell owners were about twice as likely as rural cell owners to have recently used their phone to look up online reviews of a product they found in a physical store. Looking at real-time pricing checking, the Pew research again showed the 18-49 demo was most likely to compare prices via mobile. In contrast to getting advice and checking reviews -- where the sexes were about the same -- men were more likely to compare prices than women, at 31% to 20%. And ethnic minorities far outstripped their white counterparts in price-match, by 38% to 20%. Those with at least some college education and urban and suburban dwellers were also much more likely to do in-store price checking. More affluent mobile users were also more likely to do so, but the difference was not significant between those making more or less than $50,000 a year, at 28% versus 25%. The Pew study noted that checking reviews and pricing often go together. Of the 33% of cell owners who used their phone in-store to look up either product reviews or prices online, roughly half (representing 17% of all cell owners) used their phones to do both. In a panel focused on mobile results from the holiday season at the Mobile Insider Summit last week, Dan Israel of SapientNitro explained that retailers are coping with the era of “radical transparency” in pricing brought about by smartphone-wielding shoppers. He said the Pew findings released today only underscored the challenge physical stores face from the rise of the mobile-savvy shopper. “It demonstrates that an opportunity, as well as a sense of urgency, exists for retailers to engage customers before they arrive at a brick-and-mortar, and continue the conversation after the visit to a brick-and-mortar,” said Israel, who leads SapientNitro’s mobile practice. “What matters now is engagement and providing utilitarian services, not just value centered on price alone.” The Pew study results were based on a telephone interviews with a nationally representative sample of 1,000 U.S. adults from Jan. 5-8. Of that group, 600 were reached by landline and 400 by mobile phone. The study has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.
Mobile companies will have to obtain users' express consent before installing monitoring software if a bill floated Monday by Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass) becomes law. The draft bill, named the Mobile Device Privacy Act, is aimed at addressing “the threat to consumers’ privacy posed by electronic monitoring software on mobile phones,” Markey stated. The lawmaker specifically cited software developed by the company Carrier IQ as an example of the type of monitoring software that should only be installed with users' consent. Last November, researcher Trevor Eckhart sparked controversy by posting a video showing how the company's software can log users' keystrokes. Since then, the company was hit with dozens of lawsuits over the software. The keystroke logging accusations also spurred lawmakers to question officials from Carrier IQ, as well as wireless companies about the technology. Carrier IQ issued a 19-page report last month acknowledging that a bug in its software sometimes results in the logging of messages. The company also said that the data is encoded and “not human readable.” The bill floated by Markey would require mobile companies to disclose the existence of monitoring software, the types of data collected, and the names of third parties that receive data. The bill also requires consumers to consent before the software begins collecting or transmitting data. The measure provides for damages of at least $1,000 per consumer per violation. Advocacy group Free Press praised the proposal. “Third-party companies with no relationship to the consumer must not be allowed to collect or sell user data under a veil of secrecy,” stated action fund political adviser Joel Kelsey. But Jules Polonetsky, director and co-chair of the Future of Privacy Forum, suggested that the bill should be refined to distinguish between transmission of diagnostic information and transmission of data that could be used for marketing. Ensuring that personal data is not used for profiling or marketing without user permission makes good sense. Interrupting necessary quality-of-service information may be less then beneficial to users,” he said in an email to Online Media Daily. He added that most Web users currently decline to send information to browser companies after a crash. “Some users may be concerned about privacy, some think it will slow their browsing, and others are just annoyed to be asked,” he said. “If users are asked about sending back diagnostic data from their phones, most will decline without thinking about the long-term consequences, leading to less feedback about why calls are dropped or data connections interrupted.”
Definition 6, which Monday evening was recognized as the “Viral Video Agency of the Year” during OMMA magazine’s Agency of the Year Awards in New York, unveiled a new app that is likely to create a viral video-sharing frenzy among Facebook users, by instantly transforming the history of their Facebook profiles and posts into the scripts of personalized mini movies. The application, called the Timeline Movie Maker, was developed on behalf of Facebook, and it enables users utilizing its Timeline interface to instantly turn it into a customized cinematic experience. Utilizing a “one-click curation” option, Definition 6 said the application can “create a highlight reel of their lives in a one-minute video.” In much the way that Facebook’s algorithm sorts and ranks users’ personal and posted data, friends and likes based on personal relevance and importance, the Timeline Movie Maker automatically sorts and evaluates the content a user shares with their friends and then “identifies the most engaging, relevant content and life moments to build a chronological story for their customized mini-movie.” Definition 6 COO Jeff Katz said there is no brand sponsorship play behind the app, and that it was developed purely for Facebook so that its users could get a better experience out of Timeline, which is expected to become the default interface for all its users soon.
Pac-12 Enterprises has hired David Aufhauser as vice president and general manager of digital media. The hire comes as the subsidiary of the Pac-12 college conference is preparing to launch a series of new sports networks to showcase the teams of its participating schools. Fox and ESPN will continue to have rights to separate Pac-12 game packages. Aufhauser will oversee all aspects of the Pac-12’s digital business, as well as the creation and management of the Pac-12 Digital Network. The digital network will be aligned with the TV networks and enable the conference to distribute many more events that otherwise would receive no exposure. The digital network will feature hundreds of live Pac-12 athletic events and other original programming from the conferences' 12 campuses. It will offer live streaming, mobile technology and social TV capabilities, allowing consumers to watch Pac-12 events on an array of devices. The new network is expected to launch in August in time for the new college sports season. “We have an exciting opportunity to create a meaningful and lasting digital media platform to enrich our fans connection to the Pac-12 Conference,"stated Pac-12 Enterprises President Gary Stevenson. He cited Aufhauser's "knowledge, creativity and experience" as assets in the space. Aufhauser, was previously a vice president at Say Media, where he managed the global ad network. Previously, he was the chief business officer at video streaming company Justin.tv, heading up business development and strategy. Earlier, Aufhauser led business development and operations at Yahoo Sports. Before that, he held posts at Bebo, Citizen Sports, Evite and Netscape. Pac-12 recently hired longtime agency and network TV sales veteran Bill Cella as as chief revenue officer.
While more than half of both male and female tablet owners are interested in reading digital magazines, the proportion is especially high among males, with 77% of male tablet owners saying they want to read digital magazines on their device, compared to 68% of female tablet owners. That’s according to the latest research from GfK MRI’s iPanel, a new survey group composed exclusively of tablet and e-reader owners. Overall, 71% of tablet owners said they were interested in reading digital magazines on their devices. The proportion was even higher among younger adults, with 85% of male tablet owners 18-34 saying they would like to read digital magazines, along with 78% of female tablet owners in the same age range. Tablet ownership also encourages readers of both genders to read back issues of magazines: 19% of tablet owners who read a magazine on their device in the last 30 days also read back issues of the same title, according to GfK MRI -- including 20% of male tablet owners and 19% of females. In terms of how tablet owners read magazines, the most popular way is apps, with 65% of tablet owners who read a magazine in the last 30 days doing so via an app. Meanwhile, 47% of tablet owners accessed magazine content by visiting the Web site, and 37% read a digital reproduction of the magazine. Risa Becker, senior vice president of research for GfK MRI, observed: “The fact that younger men who own tablets are interested in reading digital magazines bodes well for digital magazine advertisers, since this demographic has been historically hard to reach.”
One of Solve Media's missions is to improve brand awareness for online retailers through CAPTCHA type-in ads. Using these ads, neighborhood home improvement store Ace Hardware proved it could capture attention from online shoppers who typically shop at Home Depot and Lowe's. CAPTCHAs provide an uncluttered ad environment; often it is the only ad on the page. The ad model targets specific messages and asks consumers to repeat it back, strengthening the bond between brand and consumer to drive recall -- similar to the way writing notes help people remember. Solve Media had focused on supporting automotive, entertainment, finance, travel and consumer products goods companies, but not retail. The results from the Ace campaign, verified by Vizu, suggest CAPTCHA works for ecommerce as well. Benjamin Flaccus, senior digital media planner at Horizon Media, said consumers printed more than three times as many coupons this year, compared with last year, without the CAPTCHA. He said Ace has been receptive to new ideas, and the two companies have been working to develop a testing road map. Overall, the campaign achieved higher-than-expected brand lift metrics for both promotion recall and the likelihood to shop at Ace, according to Ari Jacoby, CEO and co-founder of Solve Media. About 40.2% of consumers identified the discount on the advertised Dewalt drill, and it achieved a 116% lift for purchase intent at Ace, he said. The campaign generated a 71% engagement with the ad; 0.50 click-through rate; 13% lift for promotion awareness; and 80,000 completed type-ins -- and it generated twice as much Web site activity compared with the prior year, and five times the click-through rate. It ran Nov. 18-26, targeting consumers who were looking for deals on home-improvement items. It aimed to generate awareness for Ace after the Thanksgiving Day campaign. A coupon offer helped drive online consumers into stores. The campaign ran across mobile and desktop sites. Ace did not target the campaign specifically toward mobile users, but Jacoby said more companies have begun to request the ability to serve up CAPTCHA type-in ads for smartphones and tablets. He said Solve Media expects to roll out a CAPTCHA product that will be specific to mobile advertising toward the end of the year.
In what may be the first study of its kind, Alexandria, Va. agency 11mark polled 1,000 Americans to find out how they're using their smartphones while going to the bathroom. Incredibly, three-fourths of those with a mobile phone say they actively use them while going to the bathroom. "Americans are texting, emailing, and yes -- as you may have heard -- talking on the phone in the bathroom," the "IT in The Toilet" report finds, adding: "Approximately one-quarter of Americans report they don’t go into the bathroom without their phone. 11mark says the goal of the report was to establish a "bathroom benchmark" examining "just how connected we have become." The report finds Droid users are slightly more likely to use their phones in the bathroom overall; 87% have used their phone while indisposed, versus 84% of BlackBerry users and 77% of iPhone users. BlackBerry users are most likely to answer a call in the bathroom (75% report they have done so, versus 67% of Droid and 60% of iPhone users. Droid and iPhone users are more likely to browse a social network or use an app in the bathroom than their BlackBerry colleagues. As might be expected, Gen Y respondents were the heaviest users of IT in the toilet. Ninety-one percent use their phone in the bathroom, but older generations are not far behind. Eighty percent of Gen X respondents report they use the phone in the bathroom, as well as 65% of Boomers. “The writing is on the stall,” says Nicole Burdette, principal of 11mark. “This study confirms what we all know -- that the last private place is no longer private. And, that the ‘mobile-everywhere’ phenomenon is flushing out a host of new opportunities for savvy communicators.”
According to the GSMA,the global mobile industry trade group, the number of mobile-connected devices will double from 6 billion in 2011 to 12 billion by 2020. Are you ready to take full advantage of this digital juggernaut? Here are five tips on how you can get the most out of your mobile advertising investments. 1. Look beyond click-through rates when evaluating mobile campaigns. If you think mobile is just for direct response campaigns, you may be trapped in 2006. Mobile can drive tremendous brand engagement -- there’s no reason to evaluate mobile campaign performance through the vantage point of CTR. 2. Be open to testing. Don’t pigeonhole your campaigns into narrow audiences or device types. Think your campaign will perform best on tablets as opposed to feature phones? That’s fine. Test performance on tablets, but don’t abandon feature phones. Campaign performance is, in many cases, situational. One device does not work universally better than another. While you may be convinced your campaign will resonate with a certain segment, experiment with targeting tactics, and choose a vendor that employs prospecting techniques to identify new, potentially lucrative audiences (“lookalikes”). The most successful brands are not afraid to innovate, iterate and learn. 3. Leave all options on the table. We often recommend that clients pixel every page of their site. It helps us determine which mobile campaigns led to an outcome and helps the client learn what elements are working best. It also gives the freedom to optimize against any metric you choose -- content downloads, click-to-calls, app downloads, Facebook likes, etc. Campaigns that have a lot of targeting parameters layered on top, pigeon-hole themselves into limited distribution. 4. Realize that one size doesn’t fit all. Display performance doesn’t necessarily translate to mobile performance. We all know that running display creatives in mobile campaigns is a bad bet, due to disparities in screen size, but trying to mimic display tactics in mobile doesn't cut it, either. Sophisticated mobile DSPs have algorithms that work continuously in real time to find new audiences receptive to your brand, so why limit yourself with a single targeting parameter or creative concept? Let the platform decide what works best. 5. Incorporate mobile as part of a larger campaign strategy. Mobile doesn’t have to be a standalone channel; use mobile as part of a multichannel marketing approach to reach audiences. It should be a dedicated part of your integrated marketing mix. Mobile advertising efforts can tie in seamlessly with campaigns running across other marketing channels, digital or not: QR codes in print ads or billboards let users download apps or drive them to a WAP site. TV commercials can promote SMS text messaging to allow users to enter a contest. Mobile is no longer a supplement to display advertising.