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Mobile Advertising the Audio Apptera way for Iron Man or Incredible Hunk

by: Bena Roberts Wednesday, May 21st, 2008

This is quite funny. Last night my kids wanted to go to Burger King because they wanted to get an Iron Man. We got to Burger King and the Iron Man promotion ended and Indian Jones was up.

They didn’t cry or scream they didn’t even mind. The switch from Iron Man to De de de da/ de de da/ de de de de/ de de dad a da…. (Indian Jones theme) – was seamless.

This it seems is what the voice and visual mobile advertising company Apptera is doing.

What?

Apptera has completed a pilot with Ignited, an El Segundo, Calif.-based full-service marketing agency, to deliver ground-breaking in-call advertising solutions on behalf of its client, Universal Motion Pictures. When callers to a movie showtime application asked for the movie “Iron Man,” they heard an audio ad for another Marvel Entertainment production, “The Incredible Hulk,” coming to theaters on June 13th.

How?
Apptera’s mobile advertising technology offers contextual multimedia promotions to callers when they interact with speech-enabled movie showtime applications. In this case, when speaking the words “Iron Man,” callers triggered the audio ad for “The Incredible Hulk.” The ad asked the movie fan if he or she would like to receive a text-based reminder on their cell phones the day before the summer’s next big hero, “The Incredible Hulk,” arrives in theaters.

If a user pressed “1,” he or she received an immediate confirmation message, which could include a link to the movie’s mobile Website or voice portal. This text message will allow the fan to interact with the movie brand during the interim, before the requested movie comes out. Then, the day before the premiere, callers will get an SMS reminder, building the anticipation and encouraging them to see the movie on opening weekend.

From the press release
“We see a great opportunity to use Apptera’s mobile-advertising technology to provide relevant, contextual advertising to movie fans,” stated Megan Crowell, interactive media supervisor at Ignited, based in El Segundo, Calif. “We believe this can drive up opening weekend statistics and help generate some big buzz for our clients.”
Voice ads get 5 to 10x higher click-through rates than banner ads or keyword ads and can be charged on a CPM basis or on a Cost-per-Click (CPC) basis – that is, only when a user requests the text message. Ads can also be played to those not using a cell phone since callers could also be prompted to receive a reminder telephone call instead.

What we think?
This is also about the rise and rise of audio advertising. A few years ago the mood on the street was that it would never work –but now in the right circumstances (in Cinemas) it could be invaluable.