Mobile Verticals: Where Content and Ads Can Meet

A number of trends in advertising are becoming clear this spring that have significant implications for the content side of the media industry.

One is the rapidly expanding reach of vertical ad networks, like Adify Media, Federated Media, Glam Media and Travel Ad Network.
Adify exemplifies this relatively young sector; it says that to date it has served roughly 25 billion ads to about 10,000 "approved" websites over 180 ad networks, with names like Petside Media Network, Gay Ad Network, driverTV, Golf Audience, Mom Logic Network, Gourmet Ads, etc.
The appeal here, of course, is to target highly motivated and engaged users by positioning ads to them as they pursue their favorite interests and needs online. According to the metrics service comScore, it works: "The collective reach of vertical ad networks tracked by comScore has increased substantially in the past year, from 21.5 percent of the total U.S. Internet audience in March 2008 to 57.1 percent in March 2009."

It almost tripled. In real numbers, that means growth from 40 million uniques last year to 110 million this year -- an annual growth rate of 172 percent.

Another fascinating insight into emerging advertising opportunities comes via the latest Mobile Advertising Report, a quarterly study of the fast-changing mobile ad market. According to the Q-1 MAR, 59 percent of smartphone users recalled seeing mobile advertising, plus, "In just three months, the number of Smartphone users seeing ads inside a location-based network has almost tripled to 15%. At current growth rates, we can expect to see some of these formats surpass mobile web and/or SMS in 2009."

The report goes on to note that: "The fastest growing application for iPhone users is games, which experiences a 21% growth quarter over quarter; 50% of iPhone owners are now playing games on their phone."

It is these changing patterns of consumer behavior over smartphones, particularly the willingness to download apps, that is providing new opportunities for advertisers to target users. This is not only a fast-growing but an extremely valuable place for product placement, services, and e-commerce players to be -- and they know it.

On the content side of media, besides the traditional disdain for considering how to optimize content for advertising and other monetization opportunities, there tends to be a general ignorance about the business in general. This is ironic, because editors and reporters tend to become deeply knowledgeable within "beats" like health, technology, baseball, and quite familiar with the audiences for those types of content as well.

The trick for a successful media company, therefore, is to merge this deep vertical content/community wisdom with a vertical (and mobile) advertising strategy. Bingo! That is the new hot spot for media success.