BOSTON-A new report by Ovum warns advertisers to develop mobile ad programs with extreme care to avoid souring users on the idea.
“The quickest way to alienate users is to flood them with messages,” said Rosalie Nelson, senior Ovum analyst and author of the report, “Interactive Advertising: New Revenue Streams for Fixed & Mobile Operators.”
According to the report, the market for interactive advertising will grow to $83.24 billion within five years, and high-value mobile advertising will be a major contributor. While interactive advertising, such as banners, logos and e-mail messages, has received a lot of attention, the promise of a high-value market for advertisers will only reach its full potential when advertising becomes increasingly targeted and interactive and is delivered to a range of Internet devices, said Nelson.
“The key is convergence,” she said. “Mobile advertising will complement Internet and interactive television advertising. It will make it possible for advertisers to create tailor-made campaigns targeting users according to where they are, their needs of the moment and the device they are using.
“Advertisers have to move away from the old, passive, high-volume model,” said Nelson. “On the whole, today’s consumer sees advertising as a low-value, mass market experience which cannot be avoided, and standard banner ads simply reinforced that perception.
“The industry cannot simply replicate this experience on new platforms-it could kill the very services advertising is supposed to be funding.”
Ovum suggests mobile advertisers move to a highly targeted, low-volume, high-value model in which users have a strong element of control over the number, type and timing of ads received. Advertising must support services that are valuable on an ongoing basis to users, making users more likely to accept ads.
The report predicts it will take two to three years to build a fully personalized mobile advertising infrastructure. Still, by 2005, mobile advertising will generate nearly 20 percent of total Internet advertising revenues, said the report.
