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What do the dramatic
changes to mobile devices
mean for brand marketers?

• The expanding mobile canvas. In the past few years, the size of touch-screen devices has more than doubled, giving advertisers a larger canvas on which to place ads. Tablets, in particular, present creative opportunities for advertisers, who have begun to customize ads to take advantage of the larger screen.

• Engagement vs. utility. As advertisers become more comfortable with mobile, they are realizing that consumers engage with a huge variety of apps and mobile sites, ranging from games to mobile video destinations. As a result, when determining where to place their advertising, companies are focusing more on how engaged the audience is and less on the actual utility of the mobile destination.

• Local market advertising. Advertisers are increasingly shifting dollars from traditional local media (newspapers, radio, etc.) to mobile. The mobile channel allows advertisers to not only reach local market consumers in real time with special deals and offers, but also to implement targeting parameters to ensure they’re hitting their desired audience. This trend should continue well into the future.

Where will mobile advertising be in the next five years? It’s hard to say because the medium is constantly evolving. What is clear, though, is that brand marketers will continue to embrace mobile’s reach and ability to engage customers anytime, anywhere. ■

MUSIC TO A BRAND
ADVERTISER’S EARS
Patagonia finds success with interactive
mobile video ad
CASE STUDY
This past April, Patagonia partnered
with Millennial Media to develop a
mobile-rich media campaign for the
Patagonia Music Collective. The retail
giant worked with top musical artists
to offer exclusive music tracks on
i Tunes, with all proceeds going to an
environmental group of the artist’s
choice. As part of the initiative,
As a follow-up to that successful campaign, Millennial Media
developed a second creative unit for Patagonia that leveraged
interactive mobile video. The eye-catching video featured
Medeski Martin & Wood, one of the featured artists from the
Patagonia Music Collective who had music available for sale.