Business 2.0 19 April 2005

WIRELESS REPORT
How Your Cell Phone Will Become an Ad Machine
By Matthew Maier

If you want to get a sense for where marketing is heading, look no further than Teen People. The publication, owned by Business 2.0 parent Time Inc., last week announced that it will integrate mobile phones into its marketing plans. The magazine will send out weekly updates and breaking news -- along with targeted advertisements and promotions -- via SMS to subscribers.

While the Teen People announcement likely flew right under most people's radar, it actually represents one of the largest commitments yet to using mobile phones as a marketing tool. The vaunted "third screen" in consumers' lives (after television and the PC monitor), the cell phone has long been considered a potentially important marketing and advertising tool, if only because it's the one device consumers carry with them throughout the day. But no one has figured out how to get the advertising to the phone without annoying the recipient. Text messaging is the first step because it has become an increasingly important means of communication for young consumers. Driven by shows like American Idol -- which generated nearly 14 million votes from subscribers via SMS this season -- along with SMS campaigns from McDonald's (MCD) and Coca-Cola (KO), short messaging is slowly becoming a more mainstream form of interaction.

Now companies including Flytxt -- the folks running Teen People's mobile marketing campaign -- Enpocket, and m-Qube are helping media firms extend their marketing reach to mobile phones. Even advertising agencies like Foote Cone & Belding and BBDO have recently announced partnerships to help clients develop mobile marketing strategies.

Early evidence suggests that only the savviest of marketers will succeed. A recent study conducted by Ball State University's Center for Media Design found that of the one in four students who reported receiving unsolicited ads via cell phone, the vast majority couldn't recall who sent the message or what product or service was being peddled. Precisely because the phone is such a personal device with a well-defined role, unsolicited ads on a phone are seen as especially obnoxious and immediately discarded. In the Teen People instance, Flytxt hopes to overcome the distaste for unsolicited ads by sending breaking news updates and other content only to consumers who "opted in" and provided their own subscriber info.

It's a critical distinction. Folks who have willfully passed along their contact info are an eager bunch. The very people who salivate at having the latest news at their fingertips correlate strongly with the type of people willing to listen to a targeted marketing message. That could get marketers drooling if they know that the 17-year-old girl who signed up for updates from Teen People is likely to respond well to an advertisement for Seven jeans.
Mobile marketing will require more than repurposing existing content to fit a small screen. Smart marketers who take into account the personal aspect of the mobile handset -- and understand the opportunities and challenges presented by a device that travels with folks anywhere -- will have access to a highly responsive group of consumers. And the final piece of good news is that response rates for mobile subscribers are as high as 70 percent, compared with 10 to 15 percent for traditional marketing campaigns. The opportunity is there. It's up to marketers to figure out how to reach us before we tune them out.