Mobile advertising update to Out There’s Mobucks platform

Eastern and Central European mobile advertising magnate Out There Media has today announced the next version of its advertising marketplace. Mobucks 2.0 updates a lot of the core features of the mobile advertising platform for both operators and advertisers.

Who are these Out There people?

Out There is a mobile advertising company that has cornered a huge amount of the market in Eastern Europe (and recently, Singapore). It is a purely operator-centred service - Out There has a habit of securing exclusive contracts with operators, and supply 100% of the inventory for the operators mobile advertising. It does this through the Mobucks marketplace - a place where operators and advertisers can meet. Basically, advertisers place their inventory on Mobucks. Operators can pick and choose what inventory they want to go where, or they can let it all happen automatically. The platform allows WAP banners, SMS or MMS, WAP Push, video, search and other types of mobile advertising.

An integral part of Mobucks is the AdFund service. This allows operators to offer rewards to their subscribers for viewing Out There ads. For example, the opt-in service would allow a subscriber to choose the type of advertising they want to see, and in return they will receive free minutes or SMS.

What’s the news?

Out There has launched version 2.0 of Mobucks. It has updated the most important core functions of the service:
- better data mining and profiling, for better user targeting
- campaign creation and management
- updated analytics and campaign reporting

What we think?

I’ve been following Out There for quite some time now, and their model of concentrating solely on exclusive operator contracts has brought them huge success so far. Is that model sustainable? Trends indicate that the growth of mobile browser and app advertising may mean that operator portals may not be the long-term home for mobile ads. But if there’s one word I would use to describe Out There, it’s “savvy”. If anyone will adapt to market pressures appropriately, it’s Out There.