Want to advertise to teens? Then use mobile

That’s the message from a convention this week of marketeers in San Francisco. Advertisers want to reach into the digital environments of a teens online world, their cell phone and video games, and why? Because teens wield an estimated $200 billion annually in discretionary spending according to the article over on CNET.

Fuse, a marketing agency based in Vermont, talked in recent weeks to senior technology executives from companies such as Sony, MTV Networks, Yahoo and Nokia to find out what the future of technology will look like for the teen market.

Bill Carter, a partner at Fuse, who presented the findings here at the YPulse 2008 National Mashup, a two-day conference on teens and technology said “The iPhone is just the beginning of the all-in-one device. Uses of mobile devices will expand to include all kinds of bar code applications and pre-paid debit card payment methods.” But, he added, “mobile phone providers likely won’t succeed as the entertainment leaders for the phone, despite their efforts to sell ring tones, games and music. Other companies like Apple, Google and Yahoo will be more effective at “side-loading” the cell phone with services.”

Among the predictions to emerge where that mobile phones in the United States will surpass the popularity of desktops for teens. Only an estimated 20 percent of teens currently own a smart phone such as the iPhone, but mobile phone and content companies are counting on the idea that smart phone adoption will spread fast among teens in Middle America and other areas.

We say: Traditional handset manufacturers were slow to see the benefits of owning content to drive revenue. Nokia for example were never keen to own content revenue streams until the last couple of years, when we have seen it develop its own music store. This did indeed give companies like Apple, Google and Yahoo the opportunity to have its services become branded solutions by operators and manufacturers alike. But the presumption that this will continue is not one that I would put any significant money on. Handset manufacturers drive the technology and control the gateway to what services and features can be offered via the technology on the handset, you only have to look at the way Apple integrates its services and content to see an example of this.

As for advertising to teens, well don’t count your chickens I say. They are much more savvy than most of the suited and booted ad execs trying to sell to them. Watch any teen interacting with TV, they DON’T watch ads, they channel hop, they use Sky HD and their Tivo’s to avoid them. As Bena pointed out Kim Dushinski has an excellent article on how to do mobile marketing right - but even then I personally don’t think the results aren’t guaranteed. Mobile advertising will take off as companies try to tap into these markets, but whether we see increased sales or brand awareness from these advertisements is much harder to predict. If marketeers want to be successful in the mobile sapce they have to be embrace interactivity and create clever interesting campaigns such as the recent Nike one for its T90 footwear more than giving away a 25p discount voucher or a free coffee.

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