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Carnival of the Mobilists # 256

A new year, a new carnival (which will returned to weekly editions now, too). This week’s edition is hosted by Mark Bridges over at thefonecast.com, and he includes posts, such as:

  • Lots of reminiscing on the past year (on mobile marketing, the greater scope of the mobile landscape and – albeit in Spanish – a reminder of a joke from all the way back in 2004 when someone suggested in April Fools’ fashion that Apple – hold your breath – might launch a phone bypassing traditional network operators).
  • Of course some predictions (general ones as well as a look on where mobile development specifically might go) and Tomi Ahonen’s latest on why all roads lead to Mobile (as in tech, not as in Alabama).
  • A couple of posts on what might or might not happen to WebOS following HP’s open-sourcing announcement (comparisons to Symbian’s fate included).
  • More on dying platforms with a piece on mobile flash.
  • Ad performance benchmarking (Admob vs mobfox).
  • A call to prepare for the (presumed) ascent of the Kindle Fire.
  • And, finally, a nod to my two posts on Angry Birds and my take on the dubious assertion that “social lost its sizzle“.

The carnival is here! Go, read it! 🙂 And if you’re a blogger wanting to participate, head over to the Carnival’s revamped homepage where you will find everything you need to know about submitting entries and even hosting one on your own blog if you are so inclined.

Conference: Droidcon, London

On 28 and 29 October 2010, Droidcon London will open its doors again, exploring in multiple tracks the Android ecosystem. Business, Developer, Design or SDK/API – there will be something for everyone involved or interested in the fastest growing mobile OS (and associated ecosystems) at the moment.

For the main conference on Friday, the speaker line-up promises a lot of learnings and insights.

I will be there telling people on how to make money on Android (hint: yes, it will involve Scoreloop‘s tools… ;-)). But you should also come and see great speakers from:

  • Google
  • Admob (yes, I know they’re Google now, too)
  • T-Mobile
  • InMobi
  • comScore
  • Sony Ericsson
  • Motorola
  • Orange
  • Reuters
  • Qualcomm
  • INQ Mobile
  • Ericsson
  • Accumulate
  • Alcatel-Lucent
  • Device Anywhere
  • and many more (check here for a full list of speakers).

The conference will be preceded by a barcamp on Thursday (28th), which will feature, amongst other things, a Google Android boot camp and dotOpen’s formidable AppCircus.

I am hoping to see you there. Go here to register (or check here for the full programme on Thursday and Friday).

Carnival of the Mobilists # 225

This weeks Carnival of the Mobilists is hosted over at mobiEnthusiast (with a strikingly familiar WordPress theme), and it comes with a lot of goodies, amongst which a stat-packed post on mobile money (and one on why banks need to fully understand it), Ajit Jaokar’s take on net neutrality, the iPad as a spoke in the mobile wheel, a look iAd vs Google/AdMob as well as two podcasts from carnivalist extraordinaire Peggy Salz: A Thomson Reuters SVP suggesting mobile is about companion products and Handmark’s Paul Reddick on why a good brand and a great app may not be quite enough.

Last but not least, my post on the state of mobile games on Android has been included.

So go over there and have a good read. It’s here.

Conference: 1st Apps Summit, Wiesbaden

Next week, I will be speaking at the 1st Apps Summit, a conference organized by the Conference Group in Wiesbaden (near Frankfurt). The event, which runs on 4/5 May, features high-profile speakers from the creme de la creme of German (and international) business, including:

  • Otto
  • Lufthansa
  • Deutsche Post
  • Axel Springer
  • Avis
  • HRS
  • G+J
  • Volkswagen
  • Yahoo
  • Admob
  • Madvertise

If you’re close, come by. It should be great! The conference programme and more info are here: www.conferencegroup.de/m-commerce

Google & AdMob: Is that It?

It was an eventful week but I shall pick Google’s acquisition of AdMob as my top (well, maybe only #2) item. A game changer, the final acknowledgement of the power of mobile, there is a lot one can find to describe the deal and for all the right reasons:

The acquisition of Admob by Google shows Google’s commitment to “mobile, mobile, mobile”, which in itself is encouraging for the sector that is – despite a number of larger players evolving and despite the still relatively recent paradigm shift initiated by the iPhone – still fledgling. That in isolation makes it great news for the mobile sector!

From Google’s and Admob’s respective business perspectives, it appears to make eminent sense, too (and I am not privy to their numbers): Admob will be able to bulk up and cement its leadership position in the segment. Its inventory and back-end ad management will be able to dip into Google’s vast resources, which is great for them. Google probably realized that Admob’s strength meant that they would be difficult to beat. And who you can’t beat, you shall join (or, in Google’s case, buy) them. For Google, it is a smart move as it gives them critical mass in an ad format where they have not nearly been as dominant as for other formats and gives them access to a lot of eyeballs.

The eyeballs bit is, however, maybe the concerning piece of this: Google makes 97% of its revenues from its legacy business using AdSense, AdWords, etc. Nothing much has changed for a couple of years and it has miserably failed with a couple of acquisitions (anyone remembering “the 2 kings have gotten together” [1:00]?), YouTube is a great site but did Google maximize it (yet)? Probably not. Jaiku was more than just a worthy competitor to Twitter; they were history the moment Google bought them (well, it was eventually moved to Google’s App Engine but no one seems to have made much use of it).

As much as I admire Google, the company (where – get this -, when in new product development, you are allegedly judged by the number of failures you managed to produce! Very, very good and gutsy thinking!), it has to get its head around more “modern” approaches to marketing and engagement. Text and display ads alone won’t cut it in the long run… But, in any event, the combination with AdMob will give Google a little bit more of a runway to get this right and – smart companies both of them are – I am sure there is more than enough brain cells to get it right. All good!

When Mobile Advertising Does NOT work

I have just been killing time and played a game on my iPhone. A free one. One with little ads at the bottom, mainly asking you to download all sorts of apps and games. Powered by Admob. And what do I get? An ad in Dutch asking me to download Skype. Then one in French offering me a free game. To make it clear: I am in the UK and had been playing on a UK-sourced iPhone with an O2 UK SIM card. I am a foreigner in this country but I am neither Dutch nor French; in fact, neither the Dutch nor the French usually like to be thrown into one pot with Germans… ;-).

Does anyone really think that this will work? And, moreover: what are ad “impressions” really worth when they only quite literally display, well, random stuff rather than ads people can also understand (for those unaware: being able to say “merci” with an even remotely foreign-sounding accent is considered a major linguistic accomplishment in this country)? In this context, AdMob’s recently reported numbers might be queried, I guess…

If advertising is to serve as a working alternative business model to paid downloads, then it is absolutely mandatory that advertising networks get their back-ends right. Depending on the ad model, simple ad fill might be enough for a publisher (if they are being paid by impressions; ECPM) but not if they are paid by click (CPC) but impressions of Dutch ads to Germans in the UK surely do not impress advertisers who are, after all, footing the bill!

I don’t know if this was a small glitch in AdMob’s systems or is more widely spread but I do hope it is the former.

AdMob on iPhone ad impressions and why Andrew Bud is wrong

Mobile advertising firm AdMob has released some numbers on ad impressions on iPhone vs other smart phones and the result is, well, that Apple is basically a 50kg flyweight boxer competing against Sumo wrestlers 5 times it weight (8% smartphone footprint but more than 40% ad impression share).

Now, very (!) crudely put, this does not mean that it is 8 times as successful on mobile advertising. It does mean however that users are 8 times more likely to use applications where ads are being displayed. Here’s some of their stats:

iPhone Apps (in AdMob’s network):

  • The top iPhone apps had more than one million users in the UK in May 2009
  • 5% of iPhone apps had more than 100,000 active users in May 2009
  • 14% of iPhone apps had between 10,000 – 100,000 active users in May 2009
  • 27% of iPhone apps had between 1,000 – 10,000 active users in May 2009

Mobile web browsing market in May 2009:

UK:

  • 48.7% of ad requests came from Apple handsets (iPhone and iPod Touch)
  • 28.4% of ad requests came from the iPhone
  • 282,493,761 ad requests from users in the UK

US:

  • 45.1% of ad requests came from Apple handsets
  • 25.7% of ad requests came from the iPhone
  • 3,804,373,544 ad requests from users in the US

Global:

  • 31.4% of ad requests came from Apple handsets
  • 18.6% of ad requests came from the iPhone
  • 7,997,946,483 ad requests from users around the world

Interestingly, MEF and MBlox Chairman Andrew Bud (who is being quoted at the end of the article) said that Apple’s app store compared to Nokia’s Ovi Store like a niche boutique to Tesco (or, if you are in the US, Walmart). Is that so? No it is not. And here’s why:

Apple is a boutique with more items on sale than a Tesco megastore. And its (less) customers buy trolleys full of wares. Moreover, their high-spending customers leave the store with a spring in their step and committed to come back the next day.

Nokia is a super-store with gazillion potential (!) customers where 1 in 20 stroll through aisles stocked with not so cool things and most of them walk out without buying anything and, on top of that, feeling fairly downtrodden and frustrated about what was on offer.

So, for the time being, I’d choose the Apple boutique. If that choice changes will depend on whether Nokia will manage to stock their shelves with more compelling wares and improve on their tills (less queuing, more bang for your buck, etc). Oh, and get those cold strip-lights replaced, please!

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