Preference for In-App Advertising Strong Across Platforms

In-App Advertising Works

In-app advertising appears to work, according to Nielsen.

In-App Advertising Preferred by End Users

Mobile advertising is increasingly finding its way into mobile apps, with teenagers being much more receptive than their elders, says Nielsen.

Fifty-eight percent of teens say they “always” or “sometimes” look at mobile ads. In general, men of all ages are more receptive to mobile ads than women. Only 37 percent of men say they are not at all likely to respond to an ad on a mobile device, compared to 44 percent of women.

Across all operating systems, apps users would prefer to view mobile ads within an app. Android users are more likely to click on an advertisement within an application, while iPhone users are the least interested in having ads take them outside of their application.

Mobile Advertising Will Be Indistinguishable from Online Advertising by 2015

About one online marketing dollar in every five spent in 2010 will go to a mobile campaign, says Borrell Associates. By 2015, the mobile share will have grown to almost two of every three dollars spent. Part of the reason for this heady forecast is the expected growth in the number of smartphones, Borrell Associates says.

The rest of the spectacular gains are simply the growing "mobilization" of consumer devices. Within five years, the majority of phones, computers, game machines, e-readers, and GPS navigation devices will be true mobile devices, each capable of receiving mobile-targeted advertising.

In effect, there will no longer be any real distinction between mobile and online, says Borrell Associates.
The other big change is that mobile campaigns will assume greater prominence for local marketers as well.
Today less than seven cents of every mobile marketing dollar is spent locally, by locally owned businesses. About 93 percent of mobile advertising is "national" in focus.

This will change as the devices themselves improve and the tools available to local marketers become less expensive and easier to use. By 2015, a quarter of every mobile marketing dollar will be spent locally, Borrell Associates forecasts.

App Buyers Prefer Carrier or Credit Card Billing

There's an interesting bit of data in a recent Nielsen survey of users about smartphone and feature phone applications and behavior.

Specifically, users have clear preferences when it comes to how they want to pay for mobile apps, opening a wedge for service providers who want to increase the amount of commerce and payment services they can support and derive revenue from.

Given that users’ primary concerns are convenience and security, Nielsen found that users would prefer to have charges appear on their mobile service provider or credit card bills.

The immediate issue is that the most-popular app stores are not controlled or sponsored by mobile operators, but by the handset suppliers. Many think that is a good thing.

But the survey data also suggests a potential new role for mobile service providers as suppliers of third-party billing services. About 32 percent of both smartphone and feature phone users say they prefer to have payments billed on their mobile service statements.

About 31 percent say they currently pay by credit card, but only 24 percent they prefer to pay that way. About 20 percent say they use PayPal, and that's the same percentage of users who say they prefer to pay that way.

About 13 percent pay using iTunes, but just 11 percent say they prefer to pay that way.

Games Lead Mobile Apps

Games, weather, maps, navigation and search top the list of applications feature phone and smartphone users engage with most often, according to Nielsen.

Do Mobile Users Value Ability to Listen to Radio?

A new survey commissioned by the National Association of Broadcasters, and conducted by Harris Interactive, found that 76 percent of respondents would consider paying a one-time fee of 30 cents to gain access to their local radio stations through their mobile phone.

The results obviously are touted as evidence for embedding broadcast radio capability in every mobile phone. One might argue the reverse is true. A "one time fee of 30 cents" is tanamount to no demand, one might argue.

For many--perhaps most--people, that is far less than the amount of money repeatedly donated to strangers on the street, at stop lights, to animal adoption services when buying pet food or at grocery stores for various charity campaigns sponsored throughout the year.

Those amounts are given in return for nothing at all tangible. So to say respondents to a poll "might" consider paying 30 cents, one time, to listen to radio on their mobiles arguably means less than nothing. It means people really do not value the feature all that much.

About 66 percent of adult respondents indicated that they would listen to local radio stations on their cell phones if that feature was available. Among all adults, young adults are even more likely to use this feature. Seventy-one percent of adults age 18 to 34 say they would use a built-in radio to listen to local radio stations on their cell phone.

One wonders if the base of users who already have had such features for years actually behave that way. Do you know anybody who listens to the radio on their mobile phone?

To be sure, Nokia estimates that 77 percent its customers who use the radio feature tend to use it about once a week. What isn't so clear is what percentage of FM-radio-equipped mobiles Nokia has in service actually use the radio feature at all.

In Asia and Latin America, people prefer FM radio over texting, cameras and even the Web, so logically, so should Americans, one might argue. Those markets aren't the same as the U.S. market.

Do people in the United States really want to access FM radio using their mobiles? It's just anecdotal, but I've been able to do so, on multiple devices, for years. I've never done so, perhaps in part because I rarely listen to the radio, even in the car. I have no idea whether that is typical behavior.

Sirius XM? That's a different story. Sirius XM gets used.

The point is that, from one standpoint, consumer willingness to consider paying 30 cents, one time, to use a feature is not quite an endorsement of the value of the feature. That's less than the cost of one song purchase. And way less than much-larger amounts people just give away, every day, for virtually no tangible reward.