Smart finds new revenue flow in mobile advertising

As the cellular phone penetration in the Philippines has reached its peak, Smart Communications has found another revenue contributor in pioneering the Mobile Advertising channel.

This new revenue service component will not only provide sustained revenue backbone to Smart, but it will also push the growth of cellular penetration in the country, providing subsidized mobile service, and unit acquisition to the rest of Filipinos who have yet to own mobile phones.

“Our vision is a phone in every Filipino’s hand, enabled and connected. Mobile advertising may provide and answer this vision as it provides new touch points, immediacy to content and a venue for new and constantly up-to-date content,” said Smart Communications chief marketing man Danilo J. Mojica.

Mojica said mobile advertising will be the next-generation’s revenue contributor to mobile phone companies, like Smart, while a company advertiser is assured to have its message received by every mobile phone holder, this means a sure audience of 62 percent of total Filipino population.

Initially, Smart has started this new phenomenon, partnering with different companies, like Pepsi, Unilever, Nestle, among others.

According to Mojica, mobile advertising is one of the tools seen to provide mobile telephone access to the “bottom of the pyramid” consumers, as every promotion with  partner companies will give chances to every Filipino, especially in the below mainstream consumer-based to own cellular phones, and get affordable if not free mobile services from time to time.

“With advertising support, communication services can be subsidized for these people, which in turn frees up some of their disposable income to pay for goods and services,” Mojica said.

While Mobile Advertising is a new concept in the mobile telecommunication industry not just in the Philippines, but in other countries as well, Mojica admitted that there are leaps of intuition to fill in the blanks to make this work.

However, in markets where disposable income is at a premium “this can be done.” Especially once location based services truly become real time across networks, he emphasized.

Through partner companies promotional programs, more Filipinos will be able to get a free cellular phone unit, with affordable and even free services bundled in other promotional events, providing access to the rest of Filipinos who have yet to enjoy mobile telephony.

“We’ve highlighted messaging here as one of our key platforms (in mobile advertising) as by now everyone knows that the Philippines generates over a billion SMS messages every day, the potential alone to this is staggering,” he said.

“Filipinos will chat on just about anything and inserting advertising messages to do these for free, seems like a small price to pay,” added Mojica.

Recently, Smart won an award for its mobile advertising program in partnership with Pepsi, during the Asian Global System for Mobile (GSM) Congress held in November last year.