Dubai: At some time or other, just about every mobile user in these markets has had his or her personal space invaded by an uninvited ad on their phone screens. Telecom operators have fought back by erecting barriers — and imposing penalties — on advertisers who want to "push" such messages to their often unreceptive audiences.
Despite this, mobile ads — and their makers — are not about to wilt and disappear. If anything, they are going to get savvier about it. "There have been occasions of agencies putting the cart before the horse… in which case the idea simply doesn't work," said Sebastien Marteau, vice-president in charge of the mobile division at Intigral, which specialises in digital content.
"As users' engagement with digital media increases — both in terms of amount of time spent and quality largely as a result of smartphone proliferation — communication techniques and executions in the space will evolve as well."
But under the beady eye of telecom operators, mind you. While the UAE's telcos already have such mechanisms in place, in Saudi Arabia STC will soon launch "permission-based" advertising in which mobile subscribers can opt in or out of the sponsored services. They can also be assured that none of their personal information will be shared with third-party advertisers.
For advertisers it offers a means of creating messages that would be in sync with user profiles.
"This way the mobile's potential as a key marketing medium is not squandered," said Marteau.
"Opt-in models will ensure that mobile wins confidence and trust as "the" most effective medium that offers targeting capabilities that no other channel can offer. "The convergence between telecom operators and media is leading operators to become increasingly more involved in mobile advertising. It had been an unregulated space with telcos, which allowed businesses to abusively send bulk SMS messages to unsuspecting customers.
"But this rapidly growing channel holds great opportunities to generate positive responses."
Intigral is running enrolment exercises based on segmentation and lifestyle mapping for clients and partners ahead of the roll out of STC's mobile advertising service.
"This represents an opportunity to end-users to have a say in the type of ads they receive on their mobile phones, while providing advertisers with a highly segmented database of customers who desire receiving targeted and relevant commercial messages of value," Marteau added.
Intigral is also working closely with STC to launch the latter's APP-Shop with more than 15,000 applications and with the "potential to grow to 50,000 in a relatively short period of time".
If so, aren't mobile apps better at clicking with a core audience than anything ads can achieve?
"Apps as a marketing tool is not for everyone — branded apps in essence are self-contained native micro-sites that reside on a user's handset," he said
"Unless constantly refreshed, engagement levels will drop. That said, apps can be more cost-effective than an expensive ad buy if you can come up with an effective distribution strategy."
Future trend
Digital content to grow
Advertising and marketing spend on digital platforms is growing at 20 to 30 per cent year-on-year in the Middle East and North Africa markets. In dollar terms, this category is estimated at around $150 million (Dh550.89 million) during 2011, according to unverified data. "Although most Arab media companies have been experimenting with online platforms, monetisation remains a challenge," said Joe Hanoun, vice-president for digital media at BPG Maxus. "Most regional advertisers have not yet built up significant experience or understanding of the benefits of investing and consumers in Mena [Middle East and North Africa] — more so than international markets — are not yet ready to pay for digital content."
It is also a fact that despite this, tariffs on digital advertising are higher compared with those in the US or some European markets. But a time will come - in five years or so based on more bullish projections - that digital could represent 10 to 12 per cent of the overall ad revenues generated.
According to TGI Net UAE's findings:
- 40 per cent of web users in the UAE say they read newspapers less now as they use the internet. But for advertisers it is still a difficult call to make as 58 per cent of users also agree that they never respond to pop-up ads.
- One in every four adults in the UAE visits online newspapers.
- 22 per cent access the internet on their mobile phones.
- 53 per cent of internet users visit social networking sites. Non-Arab expats are 73 per cent more likely than an average user to visit social networking portals.