mjelly mobile 2.0 blog

Free mobile games sites

A big development of the last year has been the emergence of free ad-funded mobile games. Just this week Greystripe, one of the leading players in this space announced that they have done 140m mobile games downloads.

Free mobile games sites are a great example of how mobile 2.0 is re-defining the consumer proposition and value chain in a range of different mobile media sub-sectors.  Traditionally mobile games have been based on paid-for games, usually created using licenses from console games or movies, and are sold via operator portals or via aggregators like Jamster.  The new breed of mobile games sites are different - games are either created in-house or from older games from the big publishers.  Instead of charging for them they offer them for free funded by advertising.  This is helping to spread mobile games into completely new types of users. 

There is a bit of question about the long-term sustainability of some of these sites - CPMs for in-game mobile ads are incredibly low - <$1 typically so there needs to be massive scale of game downloads or a move to a different ad model such as sponsorship to make the economics stack up. 

Here are some examples of some of the free mobile games sites springing up...

Gamejump - free mobile games network

Gamejump is operated by Greystripe who have built a white-label ad-funded games platform which a lot of the big mobile sites have plugged into.  Gamejump is their own in-house front-end for the platform.  They have a good selection of downloadable games including action, adventure, arcade, puzzle etc.  However, they are apparently moving to focus more on the iphone now rather than Java so they might not be updating the java services much. 

Gamejump on mjelly (PC)

Gamejump on mjelly (mobile)

Hovr - free mobile games site

Hovr launched at around the same time as Greystripe/ Gamejump but without the white-label platform, focusing on buiding its own site.  They offer downloadable casino, puzzle and arcade games - there's also some social elements like a high score table and player profiles.  

Hovr on mjelly (PC)

Hovr on mjelly (mobile)

Playyoo - free flash games

Playyoo is a new site which is attacking the flash games market.  They have a load of flash games which you can either download or play in your browser.  At the moment, not many handsets support mobile flash but this is no doubt going to be a standard feature pretty soon.  Apparently there are some really big successful flash games sites in

Cellufun - mobile games community

Cellufun is a US site which is extremely popular - they have a lot of mobile versions of popular classics  like Chess or Blackgammon, or multi-player games like “Call of the Pharaoh”.  They also have a a lot of social features including multi-player games are multi-player with high score tables, forums and player profiles.

Cellufun on mjelly (PC)

Cellufun on mjelly (mobile)

123 Play - free mobile games

123play is pretty new on the scene and they've been buying a lot of admob advertising recently.  They offer a load of downloadable free mobile games including action and arcade, puzzles and racing and sports.  Very nice mobile site at m.123play.com - easy to get to the games fast. 

123play on mjelly (PC)

123play on mjelly (mobile)

That's it - you can find all these free mobile games and more in the mjelly directory.  Let us know if you find anymore sites and we'll add them to this list. 

Related articles by Zemanta

• Cellufun - free mobile games site getting millions of visits a month

Buzz City mobile ad network still growing strongly despite recession

BuzzCity is a mobile advertising network which isn't that big in Europe but in developing markets and to a less extent the US it is really pretty big. They release a Mobile Advertising Index report every quarter which makes some interesting reading.  First thing to note is that Buzz City is bucking the recession and still growing its inventory and sales.  Also Buzzcity is building the type of scale that can challenge the market leader admob, which is serving 5bn + ads per month.  Buzz City is approaching a similar scale.

In the 4th Quarter, just over 7.5 billion advertiser banners were delivered
across the entire network. This represents a Q-on-Q growth of 40%, a
slight increase from the previous quarterly growth rate (38%). 

By 31st December 2008 the advertising network has served some 19.5 billion advertising banners in 2008.

Top 5 countries

Buzz City is benefiting from really strong scale in developing markets like Indonesia:

Indonesia remains in top position and yet again showed very strong
growth (100%). Over the whole year some 7 billion banners were
served to Indonesian audiences. 

Obviously this traffic isn't that valuable but what might worry admob is that Buzz City is also seeing strong growth in the US market:

USA moved into 4th place with strong continued growth of 47% and 382m ads served

Another interesting point is that South Africa, which was once the real growth driver on mobile internet seems to be suffering a traffic decline.

This could be because Vodacom has put in a transcoder and apparently has been hiking GPRS tariffs.  It is a real shame to see South Africa apparently in decline like this - in an area where they lead the world in many respects. 

Related articles by Zemanta

• Why South Africa (and Mxit) is leading the mobile internet revolution
• Reviews of mobile advertising networks
• Why mobile internet can beat the recession 

Mobile Marketing Agencies

Check out our updated mobile marketing and advertising agencies list which includes all the latest 2012 mobile advertising and marketing agencies in the UK/ London, US (New York, San Fransisco) and more! 

Over the last five years there's been a massive boom in mobile marketing and mobile advertising which has lead to a load of new mobile marketing agencies emerging.  Of course the big generalist and digital agencies are also moving into this area now as well, by developing their own mobile-focused teams or mobile-specific units and buying up some of the independent agencies.  There are lots of differences between the different types of agencies in terms of their scale, their overall approach to mobile marketing, the types of services they focus on and the types of clients they focus on. 

I've put together a quick list of some of the mobile marketing agencies out there at the moment - it's a pretty UK/ London specific at the moment, however, if people have suggestions for others on the list shout in the comments and we will add them in.  

Hopefully this will be useful to anyone looking for a mobile marketing agency or wanting to understand more about the different types of services on offer. 

Mobile Marketing Agencies

Welovemobile - take a creative approach to mobile marketing and also do a lot of mobile user experience work alongside strategy and planning, media buying, technical implementation etc  Clients include application and software providers like EQO and Mobiluck, mainstream organisations like CIMA, record labels, media companies and mobile operators.  Having met with the guys at welovemobile a few times I can tell you that they are incredibly knowledgable and passionate about mobile and have a great range of skills in the team there. 

Fetch Media (www.fetchmedia.co.uk) is the full service mobile agency, experienced in strategy to media planning and buying. Most campaigns evolve around the mobile internet however Fetch also include more traditional forms of mobile marketing such as SMS into their campaigns. Fetch recognise the importance of integrating mobile into a cross-media marketing campaign and are experts at moving companies into the mobile advertising space. Companies looking to expand their mobile advertising presence to the next level or to try mobile for the first time should get in touch.

Ringring Media - focus on mobile ad planning and buying - they manage campaigns using multiple ad networks, mobile search and on-portal ads which allows them to optimize spend and gain advantages from buying inventory in bulk.  You could compare Ringring media to one of the online search agencies like Latitude.  They also run an ad server for publishers that aggregates all the major ad networks in order to increase fill rates and click rates. Ringring media are the ideal agency for anyone who is spending significant amounts on mobile ad or search campaigns and wants to get more for their money and improve conversion rates - recommended.

Incentivated - works across mobile marketing in a range of areas (e.g. from mobile customer relationship management to mobile advertising) and designs, builds and host technical solutions, manages marketing campaigns and does general consulting.  They work for a lot of blue-chip businesses like British Airways, the CIO, Hilton Group, Masterfoods, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Scottish Power, Transport for London and VisitBritain. 

Marvellous Mobile - these guys were acquired by the large agency Aegis in mid-2007 and were around pretty early in the day (founded in 2002).  They are now present in quite a few locations including London, Amsterdam, New York and Paris.  Its a full service agency and they work for all the big brands like Coke, Guinness and so on. 

Inside Mobile - another full service agency working across mobile research and consulting to media buying and planning.  Clients include Reebok, Adidas, Discovery Networks and HSBC. 

Candyspace Media - Candyspace is a full service mobile marketing agency with offices in London and New York.  They do a lot of work for film, music, technology and games companies like Microsoft Xbox, Sega, Samsung etc.  Canyspace have particular expertise in building branded portals, for example, they built the Skins mobile site for Channel 4. I know Candyspace well and they are nice people who really understand how to build creative and effective mobile marketing campaigns and solutions. 

Beep Marketing -  is run by Helen Keegan of Mobile Monday London and blogger at Musing of a Mobile Marketeer.  Helen does everything from consultancy projects, to the nitty gritty of campaign management as well as training and events.  The types of clients range from Vivendi Universal Publishing to Transport for London to Sony Ericsson, Samsung, and Arcadia.  Helen has a massive amount of experience in mobile marketing and a really good view on how to implement campaigns effectively across the full user-experience path - something that a lot of big agencies seem to really struggle with!

Que Pasa - these guys have been around for a long time in the world of mobile and are best known for running mobile portals for Channel 4 and Virgin Mobile.  In terms of mobile marketing they focus on producing branded content and developing mobile sites for brands including Nike and Orion books. 

 

Sponge - these guys run their own mobile applications platform that powers services like "text to win" competitions, IVR services and the like.  However, they also do mobile marketing consultancy. 

 

Ipsh! - a US agency that was bought by Omnicom - they are mainly based in San Fransisco and New York but I believe they also work in Europe and the UK through an affiliate. 

Update #1 - some suggestions in the comments:

 

The Hyper Factory - full service agency which is active in a lot of markets outside of Europe e.g. New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Auckland, Sydney, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Hyderabad.  They work for a lot of the big brands e.g. Toyota, Nike, BlackBerry, Coke and Adidas

Mobile One2One - Spanish Agency but also seems to be doing some UK campaigns e.g. for Nokia Mosh

update #2 - another suggestion in the comments

 

UserAdgents is based in Paris and focuses on "using mobile as a tool to drive traffic in mobile + web + high street stores through mobile advertising & direct marketing campaigns".  It was setup by a WPP subsidiary.  France is surprisingly advanced in a lot of areas of mobile internet so these guys are worth checking out.  

Update 3

YOC Group

The YOC Group is a full service provider of advertising, information and transaction services for mobile phones. Although based in Berlin, YOC recently launched a UK office in London and works for international brands, media houses, Internet portals, mobile phone service providers and financial service providers. The YOC Group offers three business areas: mobile marketing, affiliate marketing, and mobile B2C services. Clients include: Coca-Cola, Mercedes-Benz, Nike, Kraft Foods, Walt Disney Studio Motion Pictures, BILD, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Gruner + Jahr, IDG Media, Prisma Presse, Accuweather, Teletext and 123play.com. 

Right that's it for now - pleased to hear about any others you think we should add to the list. 

Mobile 2.0 Resources

This blog is all about mobile 2.0.  However, if you say "mobile 2.0" a lot of people still don't know what you are talking about, so here's a quick list of mobile 2.0 resources to help people understand it.

What is mobile 2.0? Mobile 2.0 Definitions

Dan Applequist has blogged his definition of mobile 2.0 here where he contrasts mobile 1.0 services and activities with their "mobile 2.0 equivalents.  A great place to start!

"SMS -> IM, mobile blogging
MMS -> Media sharing
Operator Portals -> Mobile Web and search
Operator chooses -> User chooses
Premium SMS billing -> Mobile stored value Accounts
Java Games -> Connected Applications (e.g. photo sharing, blogging)
Presence & Push-To-Talk -> VOIP applications
WAP sites -> Web sites that adapt for mobile browsers
WAP push -> RSS readers
Wallpaper -> Idle screen applications
Location services -> Google maps application
Content consumption -> Content creation (e.g. mobile blogging)"

Wikipedia has the following http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_2.0

"Mobile 2.0, refers to a perceived next generation of mobile internet services that leverage the social web, or what some call Web 2.0. The social web includes social networking sites and wikisWeb 2.0 services to the mobile internet, i.e., accessing aspects of Web 2.0 that emphasise collaboration and sharing amongst users. Mobile Web 2.0, with an emphasis on Web, refers to bringing sites from mobile internet browsers.

By contrast, Mobile 2.0 refers to services that integrate the social web with the core aspects of mobility – personal, localized, always-on and ever-present. These services are appearing on wireless devices such as Smartphones and multimedia feature phones that are capable of delivering rich, interactive services as well as being able to provide access and to the full range of mobile consumer touch points including talking, texting, capturing, sending, listening and viewing.'

Fabrizio Capobianco has a nice pithy definition here

"1. Mobile 2.0 is NOT a mobile version of Web 2.0.

2. Mobile 2.0 is all about open standards and open platforms.

3. Mobile 2.0 is driven by open source.

4. Mobile 2.0 happens with flat fee billing.

5. Mobile 2.0 is centered on content and messaging."

Ajit Joaker has blogged his own series of posts defining mobile web 2.0 here

Alfie Dennon of moblog gathered together a load of bloggers (including me!) to post on the subject of "What is mobile 2.0 and who is using it?"  as part of the mobile 2.0 websummit on a special blog.  There are a great range of views here, ranging from "mobile 2.0 doesn't mean anything" to tight definitions:

Alfie Dennon

http://moblog.net/view/333610/who-is-using-mobile-web-20-and-how-can-we-understand-them-better

Carlo Longino

http://moblog.net/view/335132/mobile-web-20-the-one-people-will-use

James Whatley

http://moblog.net/view/335761/mobile-web-20-what

Afternoon

http://moblog.net/view/335238/what-mobile-web-20-is-not-and-whos-not-using-it

mjelly

http://moblog.net/view/335171/so-what-is-mobile-20-and-who-is-using-it

Mobile 2.0 Presentations

Rudy De Waele has done some brilliant presentations at conferences all over the world all about mobile 2.0 and has uploaded them to slide-share.  One of his presentations is embedded below and you can find the others by checking out his uploads on the site:

Mobile 2.0 @ Plugg

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: media retail)

Mobile 2.0 Events and Conferences

The big mobile 2.0 event is the Mobile 2.0 Conference which is a real grass roots effort run on a not for profit basis in San Fransisco and Barcelona

There is also the mobile 2.0 web summit in London which is happening again this June.

Mobile 2.0 Books

Mobile Web 2.0: The Innovator's Guide to Developing and Marketing Next Generation Wireless/Mobile Application by Ajit Joakar

Next Generation Wireless Applications: Creating Mobile Applications in a Web 2.0 and Mobile 2.0 World by Paul Golding

Mobile 2.0 Services

Rudy De Waele has created a directory of mobile 2.0 services at http://mobile20.wetpaint.com which you can edit wiki-style

The web 2.0 directory allthingsd http://www.allthingsweb2.com/mtree/MOBILE_2.0/

Also, not forgetting the mjelly directory which is chock full of mobile 2.0 sites and applications

That's it - shout if you know any more resources we should add to the list

7 viral marketing tactics for mobile internet services

Viral distribution has been key to growing online web services as it provides a very low user-acquisition cost.  Without viral distribution PC-based online services like facebook would never have been able to grow to the level that they have without huge investment in marketing.  One of the big problems mobile internet applications and sites have had historically is that it has been difficult get any viral mechanisms working.  At the same time, search is not yet an effective channel for driving large volumes of traffic on mobile.  As a result, most mobile sites and applications are forced to invest heavily in PPC advertising on mobile ad networks like admob in order to build a user-base. 

However, it is no longer the case that viral marketing doesn't work on mobile.  There is a lot of innovation happening in this area from both mobile startups and big mainstream companies so here are 7 ways you can drive viral growth for your mobile site or application.

1. Link to contacts/ address book

Linking into your email address book/ contact list has been the key way that sites like Bebo and Facebook and others have grown traffic and users virally.  Until recently, this hasn't been something that mobile social networks have used (or any other types of mobile sites for that matter).  However, this is no longer true - Heysan, a mobile messaging service and mobile chat community have developed a fantastic mobile implementation of this feature - check it out in the mobile screenshot below:

This functionality is not without its critics - whenever we cover Heysan people complain that they are "spamming" using this feature.  However, without out it, we would never have achieved critical mass in services like facebook.  Heysan also follow good practices like asking permission before using your address book in this way.  Plus - the traffic that Heysan is building says it all - amazing growth to 100m page views a month and 600k users.

2. Integrate with Facebook

Another viral mechanism that the web guys have been using recently is integrating with Facebook, mainly through developing a facebook application which can be promoted within the newsfeeds or through mass invites.  Again, this isn't something mobile services have made much use of - until now!  Locle - a fantastic Irish mobile LBS startup has managed to integrate its service with the facebook mobile extension of the developer platform - allowing them to promote their mobile app and site through the social network.  This is the first time I've seen anyone doing this on mobile and it's potentially incredibly powerful. 

3. Twitter blasting

Twitter is a great fit with mobile as a lot of users are mobile savvy and people often get twitter messages fed to them via mobile either through SMS or mobile web on m.twitter.com or a third party client like m.slandr.net or dabr.co.uk.  Twitter have made it easy for mobile sites to be shared over their network through their API - you can easily create a form on your mobile site to allow a user to login to twitter and share the site to their followers. 

 

A slightly more complex version of this is an auto-ping using twitter where twitter is automatically blasted when you use the service.  The best example of this is Qik which sends out a customized message to your twitter followers when you start streaming.

  

4. 'Tell a friend' - via SMS

SMS is the obvious viral channel for mobile, as unlike email, 99.9% of people have it right on their phone, and you can click straight through from an SMS to a mobile internet site or to a download.  Some mobile sites like mippin, have experimented with providing users with free SMS to tell friends with - but they found that some users were abusing the feature as a way of sending free SMS ! However, if the user is willing to pay to send the text (not unrealistic if they are on a text bundle - or feeling generous) it is quite easy to enable someone to text their friends about a mobile site. 

You just use the following XHTML code to automatically create an SMS with your URL and message filled in when the users clicks on it:

<a href="sms:?body=Check out the X at http://m.domain.com"> <b> Sharethis site</b></a>

See the screenshot below - which was fired up through a text link on the taptu (mobile search startup) home page:

 

5. IM status 'hijacking'

This is quite a neat trick being used by some of the messaging aggregators including Fring. When a user signs into its mobile instant messaging platform it changes your status message to include its URL e.g. "on mobile by www.fring.com" - see below - a great way of giving a mobile app visibility to anyone logged into a messaging service. 

6. message footers

Message footers were one of the original viral tactics used most famously to help spread hotmail, which attached a link back to hotmail at the bottom of all messages sent using the email system. This tactic is already being used on mobile pretty extensively - for example all Blackberry's typically attach a footer to the email sent with them like this:

 

Google also does something similar with messages sent via the google mail application:

 

Obviously this only works for apps with a messaging system or email of some kind.  However, people like igloo.mobi are offering a free mobile email service bolted on to their other services like a directory, chat sites, site builders and so on.  So - it might be possible for more types of mobile sites to use this approach.

7. Adding a URL to content downloads

Last but not least, here's a trick we use at mjelly.com.  When someone downloads a ringtone from the site the mjelly.com URL is added to the file name (e.g. mjelly.com - doorbell.mp3 click on the link here to see the example http://mjelly.com/track/download/3295-Dingdong-Doorbell .  This means that anyone that bluetooths the mp3 file to a friend will help to spread the word about mjelly.  We get a lot of searches for mjelly.com on the site so this seems to work quite well!

Conclusions

If mobile services are to really take-off and achieve mass market traction we need to get viral distribution mechanisms working.  To date, it has been assumed that it is hard for mobile to do this, but this is no longer the case.  If you run a mobile site or application then think about if any of the approaches above can work for you!

If you have any other ideas for viral marketing of mobile services then please leave them in the comments and we'll add them with a link back to you. 

Related posts:

12 ways to promote your mobile site

Bluetooth and mobile marketing for live music events @The Streets Electric Proms

So the other week I went to see The Streets play at The Roundhouse in Camden, it was a brilliant concert but what stood out for me was the way the promotors had integrated mobile marketing into the live music event experience.

As you entered the concert venue there were people going around with bluetooth blip stations (bluecasting servers round their necks) offering to beam you a free "Streets" screensaver if you turned on your bluetooth.

Being a mobile geek I happily agreed to this and got sent the screensaver below:

 

Here is is on my N95 8GB

I asked the lady doing the beaming if it was popular or not and she said "yes very" and claimed "more than one in 10" people were going for it.  It did actually look like quite a lot of people were interested while I was hanging around there.  Anyway I thought this was a great way of adding to the music experience by giving you some free mobile content - the potential is obvious - in a couple of years time it will be easy to beam a clip of the latest album or music single onto people's phones at concerts, load bookmarks etc etc. 

A lot of people complain about Bluetooth marketing or blue-spamming as some call it but this example shows that if it's done right it can work really well.  Having an actual person there to explain it and deliver the download makes a lot of sense as they can deal with any concerns, issues and actually walk people through the process of turning on their bluetooth, saving the content etc. 

As well as the bluetooth content blasting, they had a couple of other mobile bits and bobs around the venue.  For example, there was a massive banner with a short-code on it for sending your photos and SMS to:

So nice to see mobile really doing something interesting in the live music events space - if anyone knows the company that was involved in this let us know in the comments. 

Mobile search and location-based services @ chinwag live

Another week, another mobile event to write up - this one was an absolute blinder.  The event was hosted by Chinwag on the topic of "Mobile Search and Location Based Services" with a great mix of panelists from across the mobile internet industry and a great discussion.  If you missed this one there is another coming up soon on the topic of Mobile Social Networks on 11th November and also a workshop on mobile advertising and marketing on 6th November. 

Jo Rabin did a fantastic job of moderating the panel and made it look easy - note to moderators Jo's approach was to have a list of questions and go through each panelist in turn to get their view whilst managing interjections/ conversation as necessary.  Sounds simple but it's surprising how often panels descend into circular conversations and one or two people dominating the discussion - a bit of structure does wonders! 

Anyway, here's my notes:

Jo Rabin - Introductory Remarks

- location is coming of age but what form will it take on mobile, is google the be-all and end all of search?

- question is understanding user context is clearly much more important on mobile, is location the most important context information?

Peggy Anne Salz - MSearchGroove

- msearchgroove is a blog, research organisation, network totally dedicated to mobile search and brings together all different types of players, including operators, search engines, content providers, technology companies, media etc

- need to think about the distinction between horizontal search and vertical search on mobile - vertical search may be much more important than we realize on the mobile platform

Andrew Scott -Rummble

- rummble is a social discovery tool, which uses LBS heavily to provide relevant information

- mobile search has got to be quick, it's got to be personalized without that it's in trouble

Adrian Drury - The Cloud

- they provide wi-fi access for a wide range of devices, bundled with 02 for the iphone, have a lot of data on how people use services in particular locations

- currently engaging with agencies to provide LBS ads

 Chris Moisan - Taptu

- Taptu is a mobile super-social search engine, all our algorithms are based on social peraimaters, not page rank/ links, sharing really important to us

- also very interested in mobile social networks, which are driving a lot of traffic on mobile web (Ed - yeah this is true guys like mocospace, peperonity, itsmy.com are really killing it)

- big supporters of location but little bit cautious on it - more focused on high value, high frequency usage, which = entertainment and content on mobile at the moment

- location is a tough nut to crack across multiple markets

Felix Petersen - Plazes/ Nokia

- currently integrating plazes into Nokia maps, might be better to think about "context services" not just "location based services", other infor might be more relevant than latitude/ longtidude

- there is a real need to translate latitude / longitude into something meaningful

Jo Rabin - when people talk about mobile LBS they always give the example of finding a Starbucks, what do you think about that?

Peggy

- Andrew Grill has done a great blog about this - you don't necessarily need to know where Starbucks is, most people already can find Starbucks ok!

- context includes presence, what i am doing, makes it more relevant

- lot of evidence to show that the average user doesnt travel that much and knows their local area so what is on, what's happening, what's available is more important

- need to distinguish between search and navigation - finding a starbucks is navigation...

Andrew Scott

- Objective search (e.g. find me an ATM) - Google will always be best

- Subjective search needs to know what my friends, think, my preferences, personalization is key, i dont want 40-50 restaurants nearby i want to know the 3-4 good ones

- Nielsen say that the average web search takes 30 seconds, on mobile you've got even less time

The Cloud

- location is maybe the LAST segmentation you do after others e.g. user profile is first

- but interesting to target a particular audience, doing X, in a certain location, maybe more receptive

Taptu

- recreational behaviour very important for mobile search e.g. "im bored"

- search no longer about desktop model - new types of needs

Nokia/ Plazes

- Mobile maps will become a mainstream application

- we DO see people searching for starbucks on mapping applications

Jo Rabin - What about privacy and security in terms of location based services?

Nokia/ Plazes

- Privacy comes up all the time so have though this through a lot

- tracking vs publishing - people dont like tracking, but dont mind publishing their location/ checking in (they control it) e.g. geotag a photo or twitter is fine

- controlling location a nightmare to manage do you do it by personal relationship (tell these people, not those), Time (e.g. not after 8pm), kind of place ?

- a real challenge to turn controls into a workable model, make it managable, not too granular (in reality people ask for granular controls but dont use them)

Rummble

- we learnt from Rummble and previous startup Playtxt that people never use complicated settings (only 5% do)

- privacy a big red herring, GPS has done a lot to educate people (e.g. in car GPS) and is helping the transition to mobile location

The Cloud

- who owns geodata? the person who owns it is not necessarily the service provider to the consumer, lots of people moving into this area across the value chain

Peggy

- not so much about privacy, more about SPAM, that's the key concern

Jo Rabin - So what about business models?

Taptu

- local ads a nightmare, telesales based, high costs, touch to build internationally, maybe nokia or carriers could do it

Plazes

- huge potential, google is killing yellow pages, based on adwords, as soon as people are roaming with mobile devices, a lot of ad spend will go to mobile, geocoded ads - the self-serve model will work

Peggy

- Turkcell is doing really well with a proximity service which offers vouchers, other services that offer bargains, relevant info might work, also a link to inventory replenishment, supply chain management

Rummble

- dont need exact location for ads, proximity is fine, real challenge is building the scale to make it interesting to advertisers

The Cloud

- LBS advertising needs scale, scale and scale to work, before it can go to market

Right that's it - had drunk two pints of guinness by now so stopped taking notes on the discussion, which was also very interesting, will link to any other blogs that might pick up comments i may have missed. 

thanks to the organiser @deirdre for a great event - very well curated and one of the best i've been to for a while.  Shouts to @technokitten from Beep Marketing, @freecloud (i missed you maybe next time!) @justindavies from Ninetyten and Buddyping and Daniel - nice to see you again!

You can find some of the services mentioned in this post on mjelly - try them out and leave a comment or rate them if you like them:

Rummble on mjelly

Taptu on mjelly

Buddyping on mjelly

Carnival of the Mobilists 122 over at Xellular Identity

Another week another Carnival of the Mobilists which is ably hosted this week by the one like the Xellular Identity.  Carnival of the mobilists is a weekly round up of the best writing on mobile and a great way to keep up with the latest trends and stuff.  So head on over to Xellular Identity for the Carnival which features posts on mobile messaging, content, payments and advertising. 

mobile web development forums - a quick guide

Developing, promoting and running sites for mobile devices is still a bit of an emerging art form and one of the best ways of getting to know it is using forums to ask questions, make contacts and share your knowledge.  In the PC web world, forums like Sitepoint and Digitalpoint play a really important role at the grass roots level, so great to see the same thing developing in mobile internet.   Here's a quick review of what's out there.  If you know of any others or use some of the one's we've listed, give us a shout in the comments and we'll update the post. 

.Mobi forums

Mobility.mobi

This is a really interesting place - the types of people that hang out in this forum are "domainers" (people buying up dot mobi domains e.g. real-estate.mobi etc), affiliate marketers and webmasters from the PC world moving onto mobile.  There's also a great group of people who have just got into building mobile sites for the first time, because it's so quick and easy to learn vs developing for the PC web.  There are some good sub-forums - best are mobile web design (everything from SEO, navigation etc), mobile advertising and the boards for posting your new .mobi sites and getting feedback on them.  Mobility.mobi also runs does a prize for ".mobi of the month".  There's also a fairly busy marketplace there for sites and domain names.  All in all a great place to hang out. 

dev mobi

Dev.mobi is a mobile web resources site run by the dot mobi domain operator.  They have done a good job putting this site together to help people develop mobile sites and put a lot of effort into it.  As well as blogs, resources and an emulator there's also a forum.  The general forum is probably the busiest here -  overall the place is quite quiet at the moment.  However, again, there are editors from dev.mobi who will answer questions so its still a good place to go to ask things and read the posts that are already there. Overall the forum suffers a bit from having a few too many subforums and the wrong order for them.  Maybe they should buy mobility.mobi?!

Product and company forums

Admob forums

Admob forums are a place you can ask questions about admob and its services (either as an advertiser or publisher), there is also some general discussion e.g. how to advertise and promote your mobile site.  This is a good place to pick up info on the sort of click thrus and cost per click people are doing in mobile at the moment. The forum is pretty quiet considering how much business admob is now doing but it's still a place you can post up problems/ questions etc and someone will generally reply.  Worth checking in now and again to see if there is anything new. 

bango

Bango are absolute old school pioneers in the world of mobile with their payment system starting up around 2000/ 2001.  They are now doing other stuff like mobile analytics and web to mobile trigger services.  Their forum is not exactly buzzing BUT there is some high quality stuff on there, a lot of it posted by the bango employees.  A good place to ask technical questions and get a decent response.  Let's hope Bango can make it a bit busier.

vodafone betavine

Betavine was setup by Vodafone to create a forum for engaging with independent mobile developers.  The are collecting a fair bit of decent info and resources over there and providing a platform for distributing apps.  The forum there has waaay too many categories for the amount of traffic/ usage it has.  The most popular forum seems to be the one full of people complaining about Vodafone's approach to mobile internet content adaption.  However, fair play to Vodafone for hosting the discussion and engaging with it.  Basically, this is a great place to check stuff with Vodafone e.g. blocked ports etc.

developer forum nokia

Forum nokia is an amazing resource for mobile developers.  At one stage in the early 2000's Nokia Toolkit (mobile development kit) was an absolute lifesaver.  Anyway forum nokia has ... a "forum" or "discussion board" which is an absolutely brilliant place covering the ins and outs of Symbian, messaging platforms, browsers and so on.  It's probably best as a way of learning about all the very latest technologies like Flash Lite, Location and widgets.

mailing lists

momolondon

Momolondon goes through periods of being quiet but you can guarantee that a large proportion of all the mobile people in the UK and Europe are plugged into it.  Great places to ask questions, really high quality audience and you get to find out about the mobile monday events.  Super helpful community if you have a technical question.

wmlprogramming

This mailing list is focused on technical aspects of mobile web development, for "mobile programmers to discuss, share information and help one another". This isn't the place for clueless newbies though:

"Don't post if you don't know what you are doing.
*YOU MAY BE BANNED INSTANTLY!!!!!*
If yor question reveals that you lack basic
web programming skills, you will be banned instantly.
Extremelly poor knowledge of the english language
is also likely to put you on the fast track out
of the list."

However, for those for whom its intended, the wmlprogramming group is a fantastic community and resource.  The wmlprogramming group has been instrumental in co-ordinating the independent developer community's response to operator attempts to block and reformat mobile sites using transcoders.

General mobile sites

In addition to the specialist mobile developer forums a number of the more general mobile phone discussion boards have sections for developers.  For example, the insanely busy Howard Forums or Esato.

Anyway, that's it for now, let us know if we've missed any good ones.   

Admob Mobile Analytics

Following hot on the heels of our post on mobile web analytics admob are set to launch an expanded analytics service.   From the looks of it, this will be a fully featured analytics program that can track things like referrers, which is still a massive problem for mobile analytics. The best thing is admob are offering this 100% free - you don't even need to sign up to the ad platform.  Hats off to admob for this - they have been really good about extending their services down to the smallest developers and sites.   Really hope they don't get bought out by some faceless corporation. 

Gomonews reckons admob has gone "pear shaped" but this seems like a natural extension of Admob in the same way as Google Analytics complements adsense/ adwords.  It will be good to have another system in the market to provide some more functionality and competition.  The only question is, will this destroy some of the new startups in this space like Mobilytics. ? Admob must have a massive advantage in this space given the volume of data they can collect across their network - no-one else (google?) has such a good view of mobile web traffic trends at the moment.

Anyway here is a quick video intro to admob analytics - gives a decent overview of the service: