Advertising

Despite the recent follies of the bankers, business remains business and technology marches onwards. And at this year’s Mobile World Congress the mobile industry is putting the user front and centre in every effort to differentiate one from another. Smaller. Lighter. Brighter. Faster. Easier. And most of all, as user-friendly as can be. This colourful image is a bank of Samsung Omnia ’s demonstrating their bright OLED screens. I’d like to show you one of their new devices but photography was not permitted. What a crazy decision. This is a SHOW. There are many journalists and bloggers here and Samsung tells us photography is not allowed… it can only make anyone think that the Samsung team has no idea about social media marketing! I spotted a marketing innovation from Qualcomm Mediaflo … a technology to stream data to mobile devices predominantly for video applications such as real-time TV. Rather than interrupt viewing with the same adverts for all viewers, one of their latest innovations allows a different set of adverts to be delivered based on rudimentary user segmentation. ...

“Broadcasting is really too important to be left to the broadcasters”. So said Tony Benn, Member of Parliament, to constituents in 1968. That same year, the Free Communications Group (FCG) was founded to demand “democratic control of all media”. Lets skip the next forty years’ analysis of broadcasting motives and actions that so preoccupied these politicians, broadcasters and journalists. In 2008, convergence has emerged as a force of nature, irrevocably changing “broadcasting” globally, and the FCG might just be smiling if it still existed. I put “broadcasting” in quote marks because I decided, as chair, to start last Thursday’s Convergence Conversation, titled “Is broadcasting dead or merely taking a break? ”, by seeking to define broadcasting. Not as trivial a task as it sounds, rather a critical task if the 65 conversationists who attended the event hosted by BT Media at BT Tower were going to reach a conclusion. ...

Just watched Giles Palmer’s presentation on search trends here at Being Digital . His company, Magpie , is one of those I’m including in my upcoming eBook on Social Web Analytics (pushed back a week or so due to better than expected social life… yes, I have one). [Simon Grice listens in to Giles Palmers presentation]. Currently Microsoft’s Jeff Kelisky (ex-Multimap CEO) is talking about Microsoft search being an online representation of the real world… 3D search if you like. He’s showing a video of 3D cityscapes, but I can’t see much search going on. Hang on, no, that’s just a virtual Earth 3D demo. Mmmm, looks like Jeff doesn’t know if he’s in search or mapping. Or perhaps both, but as he’s pointed out, we’ve had the panel on location today. Jeff has also been keen to big up MIcrosoft’s cashback search I posted about recently . ...

I’m at RIPE56 today and tomorrow. RIPE (Réseaux IP Européens) is a collaborative forum open to all parties interested in wide area IP networks in Europe and beyond, and RIPE56 is, you’ve guess it, the 56th meeting. This week-long event brings together the best minds on IP networks, and I’m here working predominantly on the issues of IPv4 depletion and IPv6 uptake. This is a complex issue requiring some deft communications. Right now however, I’m in a very interesting presentation by Thomas Billeter and Fredy Kuenzler of Zattoo . From their website: ...

The third convergence conversation of 2008 will look at the impact that new bandwidth intensive services are placing on the UK’s broadband infrastructure. I’m delighted to be chairing the event, and we’ll kick off with the following speakers: Angus Flett - BT Wholesale Geoffrey Spencer - Nortel Antony Walker - Broadband Stakeholder Group Bill Gash - Partners in TV Mike Aigner - Geo Networks Chris Barraclough - STL Partners What’s the topic? Recent rumblings from ISPs have highlighted the fact that new bandwidth intensive on demand services are placing an enormous strain on ISPs’ “all you can eat” business model. The BBC’s iPlayer alone has already enjoyed rapid uptake with over 17 million programmes streamed or downloaded in the first seven weeks following its Christmas day launch. ...

When does advertising pay? Apparently, we’re getting closer to knowing courtesy of Microsoft. The advancement from paying for eyeballs (CPM – cost per thousand times an ad is shown) to paying for click-throughs (CPC – cost per click), appeared at the time to be the ad industry’s nirvana. And then came click-fraud and CPA. Now if only ‘A’ stood for Acquisition, then we could all go home. Pay £1 ad cost every time you acquire a new customer for your new £50 gizmo (ie, a sale), and advertising becomes a predictable and precisely quantified cost of sale. In this instance, 2% exactly; not 1.9% nor 2.1%. But that ‘A’ means Action, and that Action may be an acquisition, but more generally it refers to getting a prospect to fill out a form, leave their contact details, sign up for a newsletter, etc. Mmmm, still as much an art as a science then. ...

The OnMedia event this week in New York included their Best of Broadband Advertising Awards for 2007. I’ve seen more than half of these videos featured here on MarCom Professional, but I’ve included my favourite of the bunch below. You can see all the winners here . Produced by Omnicon’s Cutwater (although not going to win a prize soon for accessibility of their own website) and made to look user-generated, the video went viral because, like anything and everything that “goes viral”, it’s interesting content. This time the interesting comes in the form of “how did they do that?”, so you pass it on to ask that questions of your friends. ...

Brilliant. I have never seen such a collection of awesome and influencing advertising in one place. What’s more, you don’t even realise you’re watching an advert! A must watch.

I want to sound you out about time. More specifically, billing, prompted by a recent article in the current edition of Business Week. And what’s happened to Business Week? I was so confused by the format changes that I decided to Google the reason for it, and we’re told the redesign is inspired by the design imperatives of the Web. But, not being funny or anything, if I wanted Web I’d go to businessweek.com . Surely, if print is threatened by the big WWW, then differentiation is the key to success, not assimilation? ...

Part of Intellect’s Convergence Conversation series, the next one is on the 25th October 2007 - “Advertising in the age of convergence”… What is the conversation about? Advertising in the age of convergence will look at how new technologies are affecting the advertising industry. At a time where internet advertising spend is now twice the size of outdoor advertising and consumer magazines, and three times the size of radio advertising, how will advertisers adapt their strategies and business models to ensure revenue? ...