Mobile Fix: Mobile – a problem or an opportunity?
In his latest Mobile Fix, Simon Andrews, founder of Addictive!, says it’s time for brands to embrace the possibilities of mobile and start experimenting…
We spoke on a good Adweek panel organised by Weve this week. Along with other sessions across the event, we were left with the feeling that there is quite a lot of friction holding mobile back. Lack of clarity of measurement, lack of creativity, dissatisfaction with formats, and so on.
A couple of smart people in the US make similar points this week. Ian Schafer of Deep Focus suggests the digital ad economy is heading for a correction as the stuff that works on desktop doesn’t translate to mobile.
And Barry Lowenthal of The Media Kitchen points out that many mobile focused businesses are rejecting advertising as a business model – which is a problem for those who need to reach consumers when they are on mobile.
Now we probably don’t need reminding just how big the mobile opportunity is (though these five charts do a great job) but if the ad industry doesn’t make the most of this, others will.
The CMO of Walmart is a big believer in ad-tech and is bringing in engineers to help solve the problem.
“There are so many choices on where you can put your precious investment. It’s a software problem.”
And here in the UK a Tesco exec talks about the lack of expertise around mobile.
“Lack of expertise is a big challenge, not just in our company, but a lot of agencies don’t get it. They claim they do, but if you scratch the surface they don’t.”
Whilst tech and mobile have disrupted many sectors – retail, money, publishing, transport, etc – the changes in marketing are less apparent. Someone from any of these sectors 50 years ago would struggle to recognise their business now.
Yet as MadMen proves, someone from a 1965 agency would feel fairly at home in an Agency today. Which either means we’re immune to disruption, or it just hasn’t happened. Yet.
Mobile is a huge opportunity. Embracing the possibilities of mobile, social and content can be the way we change how agencies add value for clients. Or we can leave it in the too hard box and let the consultancies eat our lunch.
It’s time to experiment.
Apps vs browsers
A perennial question on mobile is whether brands should focus on apps or mobile web. Various studies have shown that most brands’ apps struggle to get users and even once downloaded often languish on the last screen before being deleted. And the surge in mobile search – along with huge mobile use of email and social – means a mobile optimised site is a must have.
But new research from Flurry suggests that the vast majority of time spent in mobile is spent in app – as much as 86% in the US.
We still believe the mobile web is vital; the fact that half of searches are now mobile underlines this, as does anecdotal evidence. If your brand doesn’t have a mobile optimised site you are at a serious disadvantage. Not having an app is much less critical.
“TV is just an app”
A big week for newTV – the term we use for the fusing of digital video and traditional TV. BT has thrown its weight behind Chromecast with all its sports available this way to broadband customers – potentially reducing BT’s reliance on Sky, its main rival.
It also has the potential to reduce its reliance on YouView where other partners include the main free to air broadcasters. The C4 CEO is skeptical about Chromecast and calls it one of “a plethora of devices that will trickle into homes”.
Dixons is more positive, saying it sold one Chromecast every four seconds on the first day of sales – and it’s still the top seller on Amazon.
Amazon now has its own streaming device; the Amazon Fire. At $99 it looks good and Amazon make a point of comparing it to Chromecast and Apple TV where its higher spec may justify the higher price. No word on when it will be available in the UK but we would expect it to be soon and with some UK partners, like BT and BBC iPlayer.
As we said when talking about Disney last week, this game is about creative transformation rather than revolution, as the money involved is huge – old school traditional media companies that sell video are hugely profitable.
So they want to protect their business and new media companies want a share.
As a further incentive for brands and agencies to move TV budget to online video YouTube will now guarantee audiences for big spenders – and reserve them space in top shows. Sounds a lot like TV.
Yahoo has ambitions here too. Already a big player in online video, Yahoo is rumoured to be planning a YouTube rival and looking to poach some of the YouTube stars. There is some latent dissatisfaction with YouTube but the lack of a viable alternative has meant there has been little churn so far.
Ben Evans has written a really good piece on TV too.
Twitter & TV
One area where TV is embracing digital is through social. New research from Twitter shows the symbiotic relationship – evidenced by 4.2 million tweets using the Brits hashtag. And one very interesting snippet is the finding that being retweeted is strong social capital.
Building on this, Twitter is buying second screen analytics firms in Europe – SecondSync in the UK and Mesagraph in France. Both have strong relationships with broadcasters in their markets.
So we should expect more lame use of #hashtags in the end frames on TV ads, but smart brands will find better ways of unlocking the social element. We think that brands could have a role as curators on Twitter – maybe using Lists; an underexploited asset of Twitter.
For example, could a Champions League sponsor direct fans to a curated Twitter list for each match – featuring the players and pundits who are likely to add value for that particular game?
This is good thinking around the potential for curation.
Net neutrality
One key issue around TV switching from cable to broadband is capacity. In a turkey not voting for Christmas type surprise, EU Mobile network operators have come out against Net Neutrality. The EU believes there is a compromise to be had.
“If we all agree on the need to end blocking and throttling, and we agree on the need to manage specialised services carefully, then the debate that we are having is about how we achieve this, not about being for or against the open Internet.”
But MNOs are not keen on building the fatter pipes that YouTube, Netflix and so on, need, without some way of profiting.
As BT looks to re-enter the mobile market with a quad play – landline , broadband, TV and now mobile – we have a complicated ecology. And it is possible BT will emulate the strategy of French ISP Free where its extensive broadband network – coupled with Femtocells – could give it an advantage in coverage.
The one thing MNOs lack is content, so will we see BT extend its content strategy to mobile? With all that TV money at stake, the idea of your enemies enemy is your friend springs to mind. There are still rumours of a tie up between Vodafone and BSkyB.
This is an edited and abridged version of Mobile Fix – click here to read the full article on Addictive!’s website