Tag: MWC2016

Mobile World Congress 2016: Get Ready For More Mobile Videos As Companies Push For 5G

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Today marks the third day of the 2016 Mobile World Congress, where plans for 5G network have been dominating the conversation. Companies like Intel, Nokia, and wireless equipment supplier Ericsson all revealed their plans to push for the new wireless technology. Ericsson said it would start 5G radio test-bed trials this year, but pegged the full commercial roll-out of the networks at 2020. As more and more connected devices and data-rich personalized services become available, the demand for faster and more powerful networks will only grow.

Besides the developments in IoT, another driving force behind the push for 5G networks is the increasing consumption of mobile video. A 2015 study from the IAB confirms that 35% of viewers are watching more video on their smartphones, and they prefer to watch videos in apps rather than on the mobile web. Therefore, it is no surprise that Buzzfeed, the leading site in creating viral videos and branded content, announced at Mobile World Congress yesterday that it is launching a mobile app for binge-watching Buzzfeed videos. Available for both iOS and Android, the app currently carries no ads, but Buzzfeed says it plans to roll out native advertising down the road.

What Brands Need To Do
As digital video continues to draw consumer attention away from linear TV content and print media, brands must follow the eyeballs and start developing fun or useful branded video content to engage the audience, and take full advantage of the mobile video boom to reach customers. One way to do so is working with experienced publishers like Buzzfeed to create branded videos and distribute them through their content portals. But thanks to the field-leveling power of streaming platforms, where branded video content can live alongside traditional media content, brands can consider developing their own video apps as well.

To read more on how brands can reach viewers on mobile and OTT platforms with branded content, please check out the Appified TV section in our Outlook 2016.

Header image courtesy of mluxurystyle.com

Mobile World Congress 2016: Buying Location-Based Mobile Ads By Keyword

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
The 2016 Mobile World Congress continues today in Barcelona, Spain, where several mobile ad tech vendors are promoting their tools capable of making the shift from online to real-world advertising. Among them, xAd‘s new ad-buying tool called MarketPlace seems particularly interesting, for it claims to make buying location-based mobile ads on a global scale as easy as buying a keyword-based search campaign.

The xAd MarketPlace is built off data from 100 million locations around the world the company has collected in recent years, each tagged with keywords – such as “fast food lovers,” “car dealerships,” or, more precisely, “KFC stores” and “BMW lots” – that reflect specific groups of places that marketers would want to target with mobile ads. Advertisers buying certain keywords will have their mobile ads served to consumers in all locations with those tags, targeting potential consumers by their behavior (where they are visiting) instead of demographics.

This innovative ad-buying tool currently powers ads in 70,000 apps reaching 300 million global users, according to xAd, and KFC, Starcom Mediavest Group, and iHeartMedia are among a handful of brands that have tested it.

What Brands Need To Do
For brands looking to reach a global audience based on interests and behavioral data, this new tool from xAd offers a streamlined platform to conduct a location-based campaign. The locations are tagged based on consumer interests, and showing up at those tagged locations definitely make those consumers desirable targets for brands to reach. As mobile ads continue to evolve, we anticipate more new ad buying tools like these to pop up and bridge the gap between mobile and real-world advertising.

 

Source: AdWeek

 

Header image courtesy of mluxurystyle.com

 

Mobile World Congress 2016: Virtual Reality Becomes A Step Closer To Reality

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On the first day of the 2016 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, several brands eagerly shared news about their latest development in virtual reality.

The HTC Vive, which made its big debut at MWC last year, returns with an official $799 price tag,a preorder date of February 29th, and an early April ship date. HTC also announced that its Vive headset will integrate some phone functions on both iOS and Android to allow users to answer calls, check text messages, and view calendar reminders without removing the headset. Similarly, LG is also making its entry into the burgeoning VR market with a pair of new products: the lightweight and compact LG 360 VR headset and the LG 360 CAM for capturing spherical photos and video. LG partnered with Google for easy sharing of videos to YouTube 360 and photos can even be uploaded right to Google Street View.

Samsung also returned to Barcelona with an aggressive push for its Gear VR headsets. The company made the consumer version of Gear VR available for $99.99 in November last year, and now it is giving out the VR headset for free with the purchase of its new Galaxy 7 phone for a limited time period. Samsung also brought in Mark Zuckerberg for its press event to talk up Facebook’s partnership with Samsung to support 360-degree videos on Facebook and working to make the VR experience more social. Moreover, Samsung also unveiled the Gear 360 camera that is just smaller than a baseball and aims to make shooting and sharing 360-degree photos and videos easier.

What Brands Need To Do
In line with what we saw at CES earlier this year, the news from MWC shows that virtual reality is quickly gaining momentum as a nascent medium, as more and more companies start developing affordable, consumer-facing VR headsets, as well as the tools for capturing, creating, and sharing 360-degree content. While virtual reality technologies may still be a few years away from mass adoption, as we predicted in the 2020 section in our Outlook 2016, companies like Samsung and Facebook are laying the groundwork for that to happen. For brands, this means that it is time to start exploring what VR technologies have to offer and consider developing branded VR content to excite and engage consumers with immersive experiences.

 

Header image courtesy of mluxurystyle.com