Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Some Interesting Digital Facts I Just Read On The Australian

  • Amazon reported that on Christmas day, e-books outsold physical books on their site for the first time (ebooks can be read on smart phones as well as on computers)
  • Five of Japan’s top 10 selling books started as mobile ebooks
  • 4 out of 5 Australians now watch video’s online (compared to 25% just three years ago)
  • Pay TV has grown to 30% of households in Australia
  • Facebook now accounts for 29% of time Australians spend online
  • Tradingpost closed their print medium and focused on their online platform only

Tip of the iceberg of course - will report more shortly.

Mehrak

Advertising on ATM Machines Has Finally Arrived!

Millions of Australians use ATM machines everyday, the ATM’s are usually in and around entertainment & retail venues, consumers have the money in their hands & are ready to buy. In short, the medium has reach, proximity to purchase/consumption outlets & the consumer have the tools to buy (money) in their hands – absolutely perfect. It’s a wonder that it took so long for it to become a viable advertising platform.

Last month independent ATM operator CashCards announced that they were ready to accept advertising across their 5,500 ATMs nationally (post a test run with a charity advertiser). Super exciting!

The details of the medium are this:

- They accept onscreen ads as well as ads/coupons on the back of printed receipts
- They are able to implement Location targeting & time of day targeting
- The cost is expected to be around $30 - $50 per month per machine

It will be interesting to get to the bottom of their tracking & reporting capabilities. More to report post my meeting with them next week.

Mehrak

Monday, January 4, 2010

Consumers Have Embraced Online Shopping But Are Retailers Doing Enough To Capitalise?

A few years ago Australian Internet users where wary of Internet shopping, giving their credit card details online was a major concern. They were happy to shop from brands they knew & trusted such as Qantas, Jetstar, eBay but that was about it. All that has now changed - trust in the medium has been established.


Nielsen Netratings reports that 9.5 million Australians visited an online shopping site in Nov! A study conducted by CoreData revealed that 85% of Aussies online bought a product on the Internet in December. These numbers are astounding & fabulous.






The consumers have caught up to the technology but retailers are still not capitalising enough on the opportunity, in particular Fashion Retailers. Majority of advertising dollars are still spent on Magazine, press & TV.

AdRelevance reports that Diesel Fashion's advertising presence online only added up to 3.8 million impressions in 2009, Lacoste only 766,000 impressions, Sheike only 75,000 impressions.

The opportunities are endless & massive online for Fashion retailers and it's time a brand stepped up to lead the market.

Mehrak

Sunday, January 3, 2010

"To Charge Or Not To Charge" Debate Around News Content Online Is Leading Us Astray

There's been so much talk about Newspaper publishers wanting to charge for online news content recently as newspapers lose more & more audiences to the internet. "Will consumers pay for news content?" is the key question being asked which I think is leading us astray and stopping us from progressing as we should.

The question I want to raise is why News publishers are looking to rework the same old product to make money and why they are not considering product innovation as a solution to their financial problems - it is 2010 afterall!

The world has changed and products must change too to stay viable. The newspaper does not have to die, free content online does not have to die, they just need to change.

News publishers have made a valiant effort in recent months to create synergy between newspaper & online advertising options for marketers, why would they not do the same for consumers?

There is certainly an opportunity to match up newspaper & online content so the consumer will need to own both to get the full force of the news.

I'm no content producer, but as an example consider this...as a consumer I buy the newspaper in the morning to get the news headlines just to get a feel for what is happening out there, I dont have too much time before work so I just need the bare essentials. If I'm really keen on a particular story I can then go online at work and read the details of the story, watch video's, see the photos, ask the questions, give my opinion and so on.

Want to still charge for online content? Then give the consumer more...beind the scenes, indepth, one-on-one sessions, question & answer sessions. As an example of what this could look like have a look at the Oprah couch sessions which are exclusive audience question & answer sessions with guests hosted online. For payment options just look at iTunes, they have my credit card details stored making it so easy for me to buy music at a simple click!

There is a way for newspapers & the internet to co-exists, we just need to look at it with fresh eyes.

Mehrak