Coke Goes Mobile, With Content Ads

Does anyone actually want to view ads on a mobile phone, let alone interact with them? Is this the last straw with invasive advertising now targeting our personal devices? No, says Coke.

At the MSN Strategic Summit in May, Coca Cola delivered an interactive campaign to the market, perhaps the first big brand to "try the water" on your side of the fence. On your side of the fence indeed, you'll now see ads on your mobile phone when accessing WAP sites across the world.

For Coke, they see the opportunity to interact with users on their most personal device of all, as an opportunity not to be missed. “Coke is eager to reach its customers on the mobile phone as it is a highly personal device,” said Tom Daly, Group Manager of Strategy & Planning for Coca-Cola.

But of course there is a very fine line once you get into this medium, and it's with that mentality that coke will succeed. The younger generation are all about "content, freebies, and fun stuff" when accessing the Internet on their mobiles and this is where Coke's new mobile campaign really hits the mark.

In a campaign designed to be seen as free content rather than as an advertisement, cokes content ads certainly hit the mark. They pull you in by advertising free Coke video clips and engaging you with a fresh, funny bottle film short.

More importantly, you can down load the videos to your phone and share them with friends. It's this direction that hinges the success of the campaign and it's viral opportunities, which if you watch the video below, puts them in a great position.

Here's how it works:

1. Surf the web of your mobile phone
2. Be browsing one of the websites on the AdMob Network
3. View small banner ads "Free Coca Cola Animated Videos"
4. Be taken to a landing page describing the free content
5. Watch, Download, Share.

Sensis is currently just a few weeks away from launching a "test" run of Mobile advertising across it's content network; Whitepages, Yellowpages, Sensis, Whereis... From this, advertisers will gain a report outlining initial test results and future projections which can be used to investigate the opportunities into Mobile Marketing across mainstream Australian sites.

It's an interesting time, even exciting. But there is still the 2c per kb pricing on mobile bandwidth that might hold up a lot of this. I'd hate to start using websites on my mobile and being stuck with a bill to match.