Come June, smartphone users will get paid for watching advertisements, a first such anywhere in the world. When users unlock their phones, which is an average of 35 times a day, the marketing content will pop up.
Eureka Mobile Advertising, a start-up firm registered in the UK, is offering the technology for the services.
The company, founded by Indian entrepreneur Rahul Jayawant, has already launched the pilot service with Idea Cellular.
“We would use our proprietary technology to provide full screen, image contents or advertisements on the mobile phone’s idle screen. This ensures an eyeball for every screen, unlike conventional billboard or electronic media advertisements,” Jayawant, who is also the Chief Executive Officer, told
It has also entered into a partnership with Idea Cellular to launch the service and is in talks with most other operators. Eureka Mobile has also roped in Lintas, and has also won a couple of banks. The names of the clients – a private and public sector bank – were not revealed, citing non-disclosure agreements.
Revenue sharing
In India, about 15 per cent of the total 921 million mobile phone users (as of November) have a smartphone, which is the user base for the company.
“This would be beneficial for brands, advertising agencies, telecom operators and subscribers,” Jayawant said, adding advertisements would be sent only to “opt-in” subscribers.
Eureka Mobile would offer up to 20 per cent of the advertising revenues it generates back to the users by way of additional talk-time or discounts. Incentives also include reward points that could be redeemed for both online or offline purchases and loyalty programmes with select brands.
Currently, caller ring-tone advertisements (ring tone heard by the caller) are prevalent in certain countries such as Singapore and the US. Advertisements also pop-up on mobile phones when using certain applications such gaming or surfing the Internet.
The technology initially available only on Android phones, would be available on BlackBerry and Symbian platforms soon.
Sistema services
Earlier, Sistema Shyam had launched a service whereby mobile users could make free calls in return for watching an advertising clip.
A slew of leading brands including Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Mentos, Center Fresh, Fiat, Kellogg’s, Titan and Lenovo had associated with the MTS mAd service to engage with customers.
MTS mAd service requires no charges for activation, application download or data transfer while watching video ads.
The user gets a seamless experience with no buffering and video streaming hassles. Customers using this service can make as many as 4 MTS mAd calls in a day.
rajesh.kurup@thehindu.co.in