The three-screen advantage

The cell phone — highly personal and seemingly always at hand — is inching closer to becoming a sought-after platform for advertisers.

While cell phones don't rival the Internet or television in ad presence, mobile advertisers can work with those screens in a complementary fashion to produce an integrated, ubiquitous marketing approach. To understand the true potential of mobile ads in a multiplatform environment, mobile content provider ioglobal Inc. is in the midst of testing integrated mobile/PC/TV marketing measurement practices.

The goal of the effort, dubbed “The Three Screen Trial,” is to gather metrics on the role of mobile handsets in a multiplatform environment. That data could help inform media companies on the proper use of multiple channels in distributing their content and communicating their message to a targeted audience, said Bob DeSena, managing director for North America for ioglobal.

While wireless handsets will be the primary focus of the study, a guiding principle of the research is that mobile platforms cannot be understood in isolation.

“We think it's a strategically important test for mobile marketers, but we also think it's a very important strategic test for marketers in general,” DeSena said. “Mobile is the largest and fastest-growing of the communication channels, but it is the least established.

“We have a complex task,” he said. “How do we quickly assimilate advanced measures and advanced knowledge of this new channel, while we maximize its use with existing channels?”

In the trial, conducted with media companies and advertisers, response to branded content delivered on both mobile and PC platforms will be correlated with TV viewing data. Ad campaigns launched during the trial — set to run until the end of this year — will integrate mobile marketing tactics including banner ads; pre-roll, post-roll and in-stream videos; as well as short message service and pure content sponsorship.

The trial is supported by the Mobile Marketing Association, which recently released its first global installment of mobile advertising guidelines aimed at providing a global ad framework for the wireless industry. Those guidelines are not rules, but rather guiding principles put in place to allow and enable creativity, said Bob Walczak, CEO of mobile publisher and ad serving company Ringleader Digital. Of the three-screen trial, Walczak said, “I am a full believer in integrated advertising; whatever direction they are heading, I think it's positive.”