Global mobile advertising phenomenon hits SA
“Global trends are moving towards advertising online rather than traditional media.” So says Andre Beyers, former marketing head of Vodacom and now chairman of Eyeballs Mobile. The new company recently launched the first phase of its mobile handset advertising platforms - an unobtrusive, strictly opt-in platform that allows advertisers to reach their target audience directly through compatible cellular phones.
With over 3.3 billion cellular phone users worldwide, companies are reassessing the way in which they reach out to their customers. The race is on to move beyond the clutter of everyday advertising to gain mindshare and the pressure of measuring reach is increasing. According to a recent report by BMI-TechKnowledge, South Africa's mobile advertising revenues are set to grow more than 10 times over the next four years, reaching a peak of as much as R2.15 billion.
Evolving
Advertising is now evolving to the mobile handset. “It just makes sense - in South Africa the number of cell phone users far outweighs the number of internet connections, so no company can afford not to take advantage of this opportunity,” adds Beyers.
“What makes this platform so unique is the fact that customers can choose to download the software and view the advertising,” says Beyers. “They also get rewarded for doing so,” he adds. Eyeballs Mobile will reward customers for viewing advertising on their cellphones, through the Eyeballs Paybacks reward programme, by giving them points for advertisements viewed and translating those points into Vodacom, MTN or Cell C pre-paid airtime, MXit Moola and a host of others.
“As the Eyeballs Paybacks accumulate, they can either have automatic loading of airtime as they reach a certain total, or they can choose to be sent a pin on request - free airtime can also then be transferred to a sibling, child or anyone else they choose,” he says. “We also believe that our customers should be rewarded for telling their friends about us. Our ‘Invite a Friend' program will allow our users to receive additional Eyeballs Paybacks for those friends they have referred to us.”
Highly measurable
One of the key benefits of this platform to advertisers is the fact that it is highly measurable. “Eyeballs Mobile allows advertisers to determine exactly which customers they would like to target with their advertisements and our metrics allow us to report on the exact profile of the people who have viewed the advertisements,” says Beyers. “This will minimise wastage and assist in customising advertising messages for specific target audiences,” he adds.
Customers gain control over their advertising consumption. “As a user you get the choice to download the software, view the advertisements and collect rewards or not,” he says. “And while we believe the combination of rich content and rewards will be reason enough for our customers to use this platform, there will be random cash prizes up for grabs during the launch month,” he concludes.
A large number of South Africa's forward-thinking brands have already committed substantial advertising budget to this new medium, allowing Eyeballs Mobile to launch with a full inventory of adverts.
The software may be downloaded from www.eyeballs.mobi or http://wap.eyeballs.mobi.
