Should I be advertising on Mobile Phones?

I guess it’s fair to say that Mobile Advertising is still in its infancy, but its growing fast and definitely something to keep your eye on.

Let’s look at some stats before we make a decision whether to set sail:

Wikipedia notes that there are currently 3 billion handsets globally – and they out-number computers by more than 4 to 1.

It states, “In Spain 75% of mobile phone owners receive ads, in France 62% and in Japan 54%. More remarkably as mobile advertising matures, like in the most advanced markets, the user involvement also matures. In Japan today, already 44% of mobile phone owners click on ads they receive on their phones”

So it’s looking promising.

There are effectively 3 ways to advertise on mobile phones: 1. Standard top and bottom banners, 2. SMS (which currently makes up an estimated 90% of revenue) and 3. MMS - which is effectively embedding ads in games and apps. Video is appearing more and more as phone technology improves.

In our neck of the woods we’ve been looking at and reporting to our clients the iPhone usage trends in the monthly reports we send them. The growth in visitation from mobile devices has been remarkable across all clients, from corporate to ecommerce.

Google has been offering Mobile Ad’s through the Google AdWords interface which I wrote about last year but it’s clunky at best.

Probably in response to the lack of use by the AdWords Mobile Ad’s system, Google snapped up AdMob (for $750 mil – which they found in the petty cash tin next to reception).

AdMob is one of the world’s largest mobile advertising providers and it will give the search giant more reach (just like DoubleClick has provided with banner display advertising).

Presumably, this will allow you to place mobile Ad’s into mobile phone app’s and mobile websites through the Google AdWords interface. As soon as it happens, I can tell you now, we’ll be the first to start experimenting with this ‘new’ advertising medium. We’ll probably make a few mistakes here and there, but that’s how you learn.

It seems Mobile Advertising is working well for big business but will it work ok for SME’s?

Again, I think the deal done by Google and AdMob will allow SME’s access to Mobile advertising and really start to drive already explosive growth in the medium to the next level.

Given that most of us have our phones on 24 hours per day, and most phones have internet access I’d say ‘yes’, now’s the time to be advertising on Mobile devices and as is always the case online, keep an eye on your ROI.

Google Mobile Advertising…

This week I intended to update you on the Google mobile advertising experiment, but I blog more confused today than last week.

Just to re-cap, I bought a new iPhone, and created my first Google Mobile Ad to see what it would look like and where it would appear. So far, I haven’t been able to see it and have no idea where it appears.

So what’s going on?

Ok, let’s go back a bit and review what we know.

Back in 2006 Google issued a press release spruiking its new “mobile ad’s” feature in Japan. Here’s a little of what Google said at the time…

... Now, when users in Japan search with Google on their mobile device, ads relevant to their search keywords will display on their (Google) result pages...

…Rather, than displaying on the side, however, mobile ads display on the top and bottom of the search result page. The user can jump to the advertiser's mobile webpage by clicking the link provided or can make a call directly to the advertiser just by clicking the "call" link in the ad.

Google mobile ads also provide an opportunity for advertisers to expand their reach. Just like existing AdWords for the PC, advertisers can bid for keywords that will bring potential customers to them. The advertiser will be charged when a user clicks on the link to their mobile website or the "call" link.

http://mobile.google.co.jp/mobile_ads

Here’s the thing. Using my iPhone I can’t see the mobile text Ad I created, all I can see is a ‘real’ Google Ad sitting at the top of the search results.

The Mobile Ad isn’t being out-bidded, because the Ad that ranks first is also one of ours from another campaign with a lower Bid amount.

It’s true that Google is only showing 1 Ad at the very top of the results, (there’s no Ad that I can see at the bottom as they claim in the press release), but the Ad at the top is NOT a Mobile Ad.

The weird part is that in the Google AdWords environment, I can see that there have been 508 impressions for the week (that’s how many times the Ad has been ‘displayed’), healthy bid amounts, perfect Ad Positions and OK Quality Scores. Hey, I’ve even received a click!

Above: screenshot showing Google Mobile Ad results in AdWords

I’ve got the AdWords account linked to Google Analytics, so I drilled into the metrics and looked at referred traffic from the Google Mobile Ad. Sadly, the one visitor referred hasn’t shown up in Google Analytics so I’m not able to collect any info on, say, the screen resolution they used or which region they’re from. Also, there are no really meaningful reports in Google AdWords itself.

If I’m missing something in all of this, please, someone let me know!

My hunch is the iPhone is a completely different kettle of fish in terms of its technology and screen size compared to other web enabled phones. Perhaps Google has a setting in its algorithm which recognizes the iPhone (or screen resolution) and serves standard Google Ad’s as it knows the device can handle it?

So my apologies, no answers or tips this week, just more questions…