It would seem that operators are starting to get it. Partially.
I have been reading with increasing frequency that decent ad opportunities are being made available by the people that have traditionally viewed their role as the ‘owner’ of the consumer – the networks.
Until recently, this dated (and often incorrect opinion) has led to minimal contact from advertisers directly to consumers via the networks because of the unappealing communication opportunities offered as so called ‘products’.
This is all about to change.
Vodafone have just announced:
Zonal marketing trial – This will allow opted-in customers to receive promotional messages from brands relevant to their profile and their realtime location. As they enter a pre-defined area they will receive an MMS or SMS message from Vodafone containing the promotion.
Incoming voice/text alerts advertising trial – Full screen advertisements from a range of advertising partners will be shown to opted-in customers during the moments before they answer a call or view a message. Customers who choose to join the database, and who go on to view adverts will be rewarded with points that they can redeem against goods or services.
Branded applications and widgets trial – Assessing customer acceptance of and interaction with, as well as brand marketing effects of, branded mobile apps.
Location based advertising trial – Vodafone plans to trial customer acceptance of and engagement with branded Points of Interest, (locations of – for example – stores, restaurants and petrol stations) and branded locational search.
Trial of an enhanced mobile internet browser – Vodafone is looking at how to simplify and enhance the mobile internet browsing experience for opt-in customers as well as investigating opportunities for mobile publishers and advertisers.
Vodafone myCampaign – An online self-service platform for mobile advertisers. Currently in development in Germany and Czech Republic, with further markets planned, this tool will allow small businesses to set up and run cost-effective, and local mobile advertising campaigns. The service is designed to be simple, quick and easy to use – combining creative, reporting and online prepayment via credit card.
Sounds like they have been very busy indeed – Now they need to scale their media operation so they can represent themselves to brands and agencies as a knowledgeable media owner, capable of understanding and executing based on capaign objectives rather than a network operator with enourmous reach and the ability to frequently contact/SPAM users.
The strength of Vodafone’s media business lies in the data they will collect from each campaign – It will not only help to make communication more relevant for users but also to increase effectiveness of spend across the Voda portfolio but as well as any other mobile activity the brand/agency is involved with. Let’s for arugments sake call this research.
Therein lies the real value of what they are doing.
At a time when marketing budgets are being cut and funding for new projects is being withdrawn, NAVTEQ have developed and launched a product which advertisers have been crying out for – In short, brands can now communicate with their current/potential customers on a location specific AND interactive basis.
Cian @ GoMo news wrote a good piece covering this:
It’s been a good few weeks for NAVTEQ. At the end of April, Samsung announced that it would be going to the Nokia-owned mapping service to get all location data for the Omnia HDs on-phone services. And today, NAVTEQ has announced the launch of it’s turn-key mobile advertising service, LocationPoint, in Europe.
Launched in the US in January, LocationPoint allows location-based applicationsto access its global, digital map. NAVTEQ is one of the most comprehensive digital mapping services around – if you’ve got a GPS device in your car, chances are it’s powered by NAVTEQ. The LocationPoint service allows advertisers to buy information points on that digital map, which appear on the screens of GPS devices and LBS mobile serviceswhen they come within range. The service also delivers ads relevant to a service when devices powered by NAVTEQ get close, and offers click-to-action on any of the ads it delivers.
From the release:
“LocationPoint gives advertisers a dynamic new medium to reach consumers with more relevant advertisements that research indicates have a higher perceived value,” said Chris Rothey, vice president, NAVTEQ. “Consumers see the exchange of content for advertising as adding value when presented in the right location-relevant context and integrated tactfully within the navigation experience. We believe that this new advertising service provides a valuable tool to meet industry needs.”
What we think?
NAVTEQ is looking like one of the wiser investments that Nokia has made in the last while. Following on from the Samsung deal last month, we could reasonably expect that LocationPoint will do good business in Europe. My initial feeling that this service might just serve to clog up yet another channel with advertising is probably inaccurate. Instead, it’s better to think of it as a comprehensive advertising-map that LBS can dip into as it needs to.
I was interviewed recently by David Murphy on behalf of Revolution Magazine and Brand Republic on the subject of Location. Great commentary from Dan at Virgin Media and Scott at Ogilvy, I was only too happy to be involved.
Written by David Murphy:
LONDON – Much hyped, location-based mobile advertising is finally starting to happen, but brands are still getting to grips with it, says David Murphy.
Virgin Media TV’s ‘Terminate-a-mate campaign’
Ever since Tom Cruise’s character John Anderton was bombarded by promotional offers as he walked through a shopping mall in the 2002 movie Minority Report, marketers have been pondering the potential for LBS (location-based advertising services). While Anderton was targeted via iris recognition rather than his mobile, the idea of being able to reach consumers with offers as they get close to a store, though perhaps not to the extent depicted in the movie, is highly appealing to brands.
Despite the hype, however, LBS is still in the early stages of its evolution, as brands try to understand how best to use it. But campaigns are breaking, and some neat ideas are being advanced to harness the potential of LBS. Google recently weighed in with its location-sharing app, Google Latitude, while US firm iST (Intelligent Spatial Technologies) has developed an app called iPointer that will enable a mobile user to retrieve detailed information about a building simply by pointing their phone at it.
IST’s plan is to deploy the app with network operators as a paid local search service. So if you aimed your iPointer-equipped phone at two restaurants, it would return basic information for the one that had not paid to advertise, and much richer information for the one that had.
Could this be the shape of things to come?
Dan Daly, brand manager, Virgin Media TV
For Daly, the appeal of LBS lies in its ability to deliver the right ad at the right time, in the right place, in an age when media fragmentation is making it more of a challenge for brands to get across their messages.
“LBS offers marketers the opportunity to create tailored messages to relevant audiences in highly targeted environments,” says Daly. “It’s perfect for all levels of marketing, from local, tactical spends through to national broadcast offerings.”
Daly sees LBS as great for building brand advocacy, particularly among the difficult-to-reach youth audience. “The mobile channel offers a highly personal form of communication with the audience, while delivering the message at an appropriate time and in a relevant tone,” he says. “The platform’s ability to deliver highly targeted audiences means minimal waste.”
To brands considering using LBS, Daly offers the following advice: “Know your audience’s mindset. Understand the importance of tailored, relevant messaging; blanket messaging simply doesn’t work.”
As for Virgin Media TV, Daly says the success the brand enjoyed with its first foray into LBS has encouraged it to come back for more. “It worked extremely well, both from a brand awareness and engagement point of view. Our main objective was to raise the profile of our brand among an audience of tech-savvy, early adopters, and it was an exciting promotion for the brand and the audience, with a high element of risk involved. We plan to continue using LBS, and are working on plans across our portfolio.”
Alistair Crane, head of media, NAVTEQ Europe BV
“We currently allow brands to advertise by displaying their logo on a map to show the location of their outlets. In the third quarter of 2009, we will be introducing an interactive messaging capability that will enable brands to target consumers with offers as they approach an outlet,” says Crane. “It’s taking the type of promotion that happens in- store and moving it out into the car park and beyond.”
For Crane, the main benefit of an LBS campaign is its ability to boost sales. While transactional websites use cookies to target returning visitors based on their previous behaviour, and social networking sites are big on profiling data, with LBS it is all about the here and now.
Crane explains: “LBS is not as heavily profiled as social media, but if there’s a golf store two minutes from where you are now and it is having a half-price sale today – and we have some information on you that says you like sport – then you are a very good person to target with a location-based ad promoting that sale, and there’s a good chance that you will check it out.”
For LBS to work, says Crane, permission is vital. He notes also that, as with anything new, there are, as yet, no rules for LBS.
“Don’t just look at what worked last time and do it again,” he says. “You have to think about who you’re targeting and make it relevant.” And he ends with a rallying call for brands looking at LBS to take the plunge.
“The key point is that brands and agencies need to involve companies offering new concepts in briefs and introduce clients to LBS and other ideas sooner rather than later,” he says. “That’s how to move the industry forward, not by falling back on the same old solutions.”
Scott Seaborn, head of mobile, Ogilvy Group UK
Seaborn believes that LBS offers tremendous potential for brands to engage, acquire and activate consumers, and as a way of helping consumers find useful services. ING, he notes, has a mobile app that helps consumers find their nearest cashpoint.
To use LBS effectively, however, Seaborn says that brands need to work under the three laws of permission, privacy and preference.
“Permission means that consumers must be opted in to whatever activity is being undertaken,” he argues. “Where LBS is concerned, permission is particularly important. If you look at proximity (Bluetooth) marketing, the best way to do it would be to follow the Mobile Marketing Association’s guidelines and get people to opt in to receive the message.”
When the World Rally Championship came to Wales last December, Ogilvy created a mobile app for BP that attendees could download for free. “We had promotional girls wearing Bluetooth necklaces walking among the crowds asking if they wanted the download,” says Seaborn. “If they said yes, it was sent to their phone there and then. This was extremely effective and was less intrusive than just sending out content from a Bluetooth transmitter.”
Privacy, says Seaborn, means that consumers should be told what data, if any, the brand will be collecting about them, and how it intends to use it, while preference involves engaging with consumers to make campaigns more relevant to them.
“Preference is important because it brings in context,” says Seaborn. “Six years ago, everyone was raving about the potential to run a Starbucks mobile campaign offering consumers a coupon for a free coffee as they walked past, but actually, if it’s a blazing hot day, a coffee is probably the last thing people would want. You can do great things with LBS, but if the context is wrong, your campaign will be scuppered.”
Casebook: How Virgin Media tackled location-based advertising
Virgin Media Television (VMtv) recently commissioned 20:20 London to devise a campaign for the launch of its showpiece TV series, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.
To appeal to the core 16 to 39 year-old, mostly male, target audience, 20:20 worked with mobile agency Incentivated to devise an innovative, location-based mobile campaign. Dubbed ‘Terminate-a-mate’, the campaign was promoted via online banners and overlays.
By entering a friend’s phone number into a dedicated web or mobile site, fans of the show could have a text sent warning them that ‘the Terminator was close by’. If the recipient agreed for their location to be shared, they were sent a link to a made-for-mobile video. Using LBS (location-based advertising services) to identify the user’s location by reference to the nearest mobile cellsite, the recipient’s location was highlighted in the video via an integrated map. Users could also personalise the video and forward it on.
In total, 9,186 visitors to the Terminate-a-mate website clicked on the ‘Terminate now’ button to send the text to a friend’s phone; 2,865 of these recipients passed the message on themselves. The video was viewed 10,971 times.
The buzz created by the campaign extended to blogs and red-top press coverage, while the campaign itself helped to deliver Virgin 1′s biggest-ever audience, which was 400 per cent higher than the channel’s previous highest-rated show.
“It takes brave brands like Virgin to push the boundaries and exploit mobile’s immense potential to extend campaign reach by going viral,” says Incentivated commercial director Robert Thurner.
He adds: “Personalised videos and mobile maps reinforced the Terminator message, and succeeded in capturing viewers’ imagination.”
ASDA is promoting its UK stores with a new service that places its logo where its stores are located on satnav maps.
As the supermarket tries to drive cash-strapped consumers into stores, it has signed up to NAVTEQ’s Direct Access adverrtiser solution which allows ASDA to provide people with store information on a branded map.
ASDA said the maps work as a cost-effective advertising platform for the supermarket, as they reach users ‘at the moment they are ready to make a purchase’.
Research has prpven that 74% of people prefer to see brand logos on the map rather than generic icons and 62% of navigation system owners drive to the businesses that they look up on their navigation devices. It allows banks, coffee shops, petrol stations, grocery stores, hotels, chemists, restaurants and other retailers to advertise their services on NAVTEQ maps.
This piece was originally blogged at Mashable.com.
All Google and the various app developers have to do is figure out how to make money from all these services and everything will be sorted – I can already hear you saying ‘AdWords’ but you’re WRONG. Hardly a great way of monetising location specific, interactive opportunities. I’m thinking about using more enaging creative to begin the drive for user attention.
Most people think of Google Maps in terms of finding a place or business, or getting directions from one point to another. Others use the satellite images and terrain mapping features. But there are tons of other uses out there for Google maps.
From mapping the weather and news to mapping things that aren’t maps at all, like paintings or magazines, Google Maps has a lot to offer. And there are free tools available out there for those who want to use the Google Maps API without doing a bunch of coding. Here are more than 100 of the best mashups and tools out there right now.
Travel and Transportation
Mapness – An online travel journal that interfaces with Google Maps to show where you’ve been.
TubeJP – A London Tube journey planner using Google Maps that also incorporates a search function to find local businesses.
District Taxi Fare Estimator – A taxi fare estimator provided by the Washington Post that shows travel routes in Google Maps.
Washington, CD Taxicab Zones – A zone map that covers each taxicab zone and is zoomable, unlike the ones in the actual cabs that are poorly labeled and hard to read.
Perfect Escapes – A travel search engine that features a click-through Google Maps search interface.
hotspotr – A map showing more than 14,875 wifi hotspots all over the country.
safe2pee.org – Find a public bathroom anywhere in the country.
Mezzoman – Find a place to meet in the middle of two points on the map.
Wines and Times – Use this map to plan a winery tour anywhere in the United States.
fastfoodmaps.com – Find fast food restaurants, including McDonald’s, Pizza Hut, KFC, Wendy’s and more, anywhere in the U.S.
Photo Enforced – Get maps of red light cameras in multiple cities across the United States.
World Port Source – Maps of more than 3,100 ports in 189 countries, plus a map to find ports anywhere in the world.
IMB Live Piracy Map 2008 – A map of all of the armed robbery and piracy incidents (both successful and attempted) reported over the past year.
flexTraffic – A map of traffic delays and construction projects across the UK.
Cheap Hotels – A map of more than 66,000 cheap hotels in more than 165 countries that also lets you book online.
NOAA Nautical Maps – A mashup that overlays NOAA nautical maps over Google Maps and allows you to adjust the transparency of each.
News, Weather and Politics
Gaza Conflict YouTube Videos Map – This mashup shows the latest YouTube videos about the Gaza conflict attached to their locations along the Gaza Strip and elsewhere.
Track This Now – Search for news worldwide or in a specific country (or group of countries) and have news stories marked on a map.
TimeSpace: World – An interactive map from the Washington post that shows current news items linked from a world map.
iMap Weather – An easy way to get current weather conditions and the forecast using a map-based interface.
Missing Kids Map – A mashup that shows the origins of missing kids (from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) on a Google Map.
Map of Election Conditions in Zimbabwe – A map of the corruption, from vote buying and gerrymandering to abduction and murder, that occurred in elections in Zimbabwe.
San Francisco Solar Map – This interactive map shows residential, municipal, commercial, and other solar projects around San Francisco.
RoofRay Solar Calculator – Find your house on their Google Maps interface, trace your roof, determine the roof’s orientation and pitch, and get a solar estimate.
Climate Change Wales – Interactive maps that show what flood levels will be based on rising sea levels from climate change.
United States Sea Level Rise Map – A map with geotagged photos that show the impact of different sea level rises in cities around the United States.
Flood Maps – Shows what new coastlines would be for sea level rises between 1M and 14M.
MapEcos – A map showing U.S. industrial facilities that use toxic chemicals and includes information about each facility.
Wasting Away – A map showing all 1,623 superfund sites in the United States, including sites that have been cleaned up.
DaylightMap.com’s Clouds – A map showing regularly-updated cloud cover overlaid on a Google Map of the world.
Where is the path (or street) – A mashup that shows regular street and footpath maps next to a Google Maps satellite view so that you can see things not indicated on the Google Map.
BibleMap.org – An interactive map of locations from the Bible.
World Heritage Google Map – A Google Map of UNESCO World Heritage Sites worldwide that includes photos.
MailboxMap – Find a USPS or UPS mailbox anywhere in the country.
UFOmaps.com – A map of UFO sightings all over the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Qibla Locator – Find which direction Muslims should pray in from anywhere in the world.
PlaceOpedia – A map of Wikipedia articles linked to their locations.
Meteor Craters – A map of meteor impact craters around the world.
World’s Creepiest Places – Just as the name implies, this map shows information about the world’ creepiest places.
Housing and Real Estate
Roomapes – An apartment finder app with a Google Maps interface.
CribQ – An apartment finder for San Francisco that interfaces apartment listings, Google Maps and Microsoft Virtual Earth (for a birdseye view, streetview and WalkScore).
SuiteMatch.com – Find shared office space and see a map that shows all of the amenities surrounding that space including coffee, food, bars and gyms.
Non-Map Uses
The Kremer Collection – Use a Google Maps interface to browse a large collection of paintings.
zkimmer – An online publication viewer for newspapers and magazines that uses the Google Maps UI.
Other Maps
Samknows – Find a house or building on a map of the UK and see what types of broadband internet are available at that address.
Despite NAVTEQ having excellent revenue streams generated through the sale of map licensing, the senior management have identified a need to expand and develop the business – All credit to them.
NAVTEQ Media Solutions is the advertising arm of the organization, responsible for offering brands and agencies an interactive advertising platform capable of targeting users via in-car, personal navigation device (PND) or mobile navigation devices.
The first agency group to publicly announce their involvement were IPG – This was made public at CES in Las Vegas, press release excerpt:
NAVTEQ, a leading global provider of digital map data for location-based solutions and vehicle navigation, today announced it is working with the Interpublic (IPG) Emerging Media Lab (http://www.ipglab.com) to demonstrate NAVTEQ LocationPoint(TM) advertising featuring new mobile location based targeting capabilities for marketers. The IPG Emerging Media Lab, a division of Mediabrands, allows Interpublic agencies, their clients, marketers and vendor lab members to experience new trends and technologies shaping the advertising industry
The Lab will feature an array of location based services using NAVTEQ LocationPoint advertising technology. These demonstrations will allow marketers to experience the benefits of pinpoint consumer targeting with engaging interactive promotions using mapping and GPS technology. The Lab will also work with NAVTEQ to facilitate meetings with IPG agencies and their clients.
Incredible work from Zurich University of Applied Sciences has produced the video below showing a 24hr snapshot of all commercial flights worldwide. Simply fantastic to watch, I played back several times paying attention to particular regions as the influx of planes changed by time of day. Enjoy.
We will see more and more interesting data relating to movement of people being published in the public domain in the very near future and contrary to popular belief, I do not see this as such a bad thing.
I hear constant rebuttals against location based anything – The main one being privacy.
OK, I get this. A person does not want to be transmitting their location, movement, preferred transport type etc. every second of the day to anyone who wants to access it. This is not desirable or practical from a consumer perspective nor is it scalable or saleable from a commercial standpoint – There is no way that a corporate entity can make best use of selling a persons location details 24/7.
Instead, I would highly recommend that anyone interested in Location Based Services (including advertising) considers the following.
It’s perfectly acceptable to communicate with users based on their location/proximity if they have given their permission aka OPTING-IN.
Use this as a start point, once an individual has given permission it is also a good idea to try and ascertain some additional information around likes and dislikes which will help you tailor your communication with them to be as relevant as possible thus negating any quibbles around privacy or preference and engendering positive reaction toward your service.
There are already some excellent examples of how to build a business model around user location AND retain trust – Look in to Rippll, a location based mobile social network with some very clever user features.
Next up on my list of Ones To Watch is a biased entry as I work for them but everything is biased in one way or another so I don’t see it as a negative thing:-).
I am very proud to be working for NAVTEQ and leading the cutting edge development of Location Based Advertising. Recently acquired by Nokia (read official press release here), the innovative map-based advertising opportunities coupled with the sheer scale of a worldwide user base (in excess of 100M) means that NAVTEQ is able to offer absolutely unprecedented location=relevant marketing opportunities and I would urge anyone even remotely interested in communicating with consumers depending upon their proximity to store and geographic location to keep an eye on NAVTEQ Media Solutions - More coming here soon.
AroundMe is an absolute must have for anyone with an iPhone – A great app which tells you what bars, restaurants, cinemas, hospitals etc. are near to your current location with the ability to click to MAP, call and Web.
Screenshots of how the service works:
There is a lot of interest coming from the major advertisers whenever location based promotional opportunities are mentioned. Just like with every other advertising opportunity that has come before it, LBA needs a combination of big name brands and some kind of investment in time and marketing spend to gather the necessary results needed to seal LBA as a viable, buyable and scalable marketing opportunity.
I have no idea whether 2009 will be the year for LBA… some people are still waiting for the year of ‘mobile’. I fear this ellusive ‘year’ will not arrive.
2009 will certainly be a year of recession, which in turn means that marketers will have to innovate, analyse and track each and every marketing buck they spend to get the most from what will almost certainly be a reduced purse. Surely this can only be a good thing for digital media that is relevant, interactive and engaging – This is firmly where I see LBA making a difference.
