Mobile programmatic: brand builder or brand buster?

Patrick Darcy, RadiumOne Commercial Director - APAC
By Patrick Darcy, RadiumOne Commercial Director - APAC | 26 November 2015
 
Patrick Darcy, RadiumOne Commercial Director - APAC.

The mobile programmatic space in Australia has the potential to be the most efficient brand builder - or the most effective brand buster. The challenge for brands in 2016 is being on the right side of that divide.

The latest IAB Australia and Nielsen Mobile Ratings Report, released this week, revealed that for the first time Australians spent more time on tablet devices than on a PC. While it is no surprise that smartphones are still the preferred device in Australia, this is the first report that has positioned the PC in third place behind the tablet.

This is another proof point supporting the need for brands to take a mobile-first approach. And rapidly, they are. Zenith Optimedia recently released a study which estimates that global mobile advertising spend will overtake newspapers in 2016. eMarketer predicts that advertising investment on mobile will grow to 64% of all digital advertising spend in Australia by 2018.

Whichever way you look at it, Australian brands are and need to be placing their bets on mobile. It’s a fast evolving and often misunderstood area of marketing. Here are three concepts important to understand before jumping into mobile programmatic.

1. Mobile data goes from valuable to useless in minutes. Timing is everything and speed is critical in mobile. We need to be talking to consumers in the “right now” based on data that is giving us accurate intent signals, in real time. Send a discount for a pizza within minutes to a hungry user, and you're a welcome brand who adds value to their experience. Send the same advertisement even 20 minutes later - when the purchase has been made elsewhere and your products or services are no longer needed - and you're an uninvited intruder. Through geolocation, beacon, recent payment, search and live sharing data, mobile is the most effective channel to act accurately and quickly to capitalise on the first few minutes after a consumer signals intent - when it's most valuable.

2. Relevance and timing are replacing reach and frequency. In a recent study from Millward Brown, consumers reported that they received video advertisements delivered on their smartphone more negatively than on tablets, computers, on-demand TV or live TV. Essentially, before the creative is even served up, it's perceived negatively. As a result, perhaps the recent market focus on ad blocking may actually be a good thing for all parties; it forces brands to develop the sort of creative content that users will not want to block.

When it comes to mobile, marketers should be coming at this challenge from the opposite direction; tapping into live intent signals and emotional states of consumers as the catalyst for marketing activity, rather than the goal.

3. Weave in "dark social." Our most recent study found that 75% of all social sharing in Australia is via email and instant messaging (dark social) and 71% of click-backs on shared content happens via mobile devices. “Dark social” is where consumers copy and paste links or page content into emails or instant messages, and selectively share with their ‘intimate social networks’ - friends, family and colleagues - rather than posting onto public social networks.

For each dark social share, the content and the people it’s being shared with are selected for a very specific reason. This data is incredibly powerful, especially when merged with mobile targeting capabilities and real time media buying. Integrating these insights into a broader mobile campaign will make mobile efforts exponentially more targeted and impactful, helping build your brand through positive connection with consumers.

The power around a brand’s image or product is now (literally!) ‘in the hands’ of mobile consumers. Bringing these elements into mobile strategy will go a long way toward ensuring a valuable return on investment in the exciting mobile programmatic space.

By Patrick Darcy, RadiumOne commercial director - APAC.

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