'We Have Capitalised On The Tablet Culture'

With the internet experience moving swiftly to the ‘small screen’, mobile advertising is emerging as a lucrative option for companies. Vdopia, an online and mobile video advertising company, enables major brands to engage with their target demographic in premium digital environments and create brand awareness. In an email interview, Preetesh Chouhan, VP - APAC, Vdopia talks to BW | Businessworld Online’s Tanuja Chatterjee  about the company’s plans to cash in on the IPL season and the potential of mobile advertising in India.

 

Vdopia is a leading in mobile and online video advertising network, enabling major brands to engage their desired audiences in premium content environments around the world. It is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices across the US and India. 

 

Our company has introduced video advertising to mobile devices and is the only provider of auto-play video ads running across both apps and the mobile web.  Its proprietary technology enables the most scalable mobile platform for video and rich media, and powers the world’s largest mobile video ad network, delivering hundreds of millions of video and rich media ad impressions each month.

 

In the Asia-Pacific market, Vdopia also provides clients with the largest network for online video ads as rated by comScore, and patented technology for their large-scale, real-time integration in live content.  Vdopia’s global client base includes Nokia, Scion, Microsoft, Sony Pictures, MillerCoors, Wrigley, Bausch & Lomb, Samsung, Lufthansa, Disney and Vodafone.

 

Vdopia studied the behaviour of users and realised that they are prone towards consumption of cricket on multiple sites. Consequently, we connected with various sites which have IPL and cricket related content. This package covers pure cricket content including galleries, live score updates etc. Thus we were able to create a bouquet of cricket content sites and present it to interested advertisers. Since we integrated all these sites, our technological prowess ensured that we are able to utilise our Ad servers and maximise reach or frequency on basis of client requirement.

 

As far as mobile is concerned, we have an integration with NexGTV App, which is the official app for IPL6 streaming. The app allows user to watch IPL6 live and also allows the user to watch highlights and other VOD content. Vdopia has floated multiple sponsorships for brands who want to associate with live streaming on mobile.

 

The response has been phenomenal with users spending an average time of 22 minutes on live streaming. The app has been consumed by more than a million unique users within the first week of IPL 6 reaching out to more than 2 Lakh users on a daily basis.

 

The internet has been reinvented on mobile devices —becoming smaller, more personal, customisable, and accessible anywhere on the go. Mobile advertising includes a broad range of opportunities such as search, banner displays, messaging, multimedia messaging, video and advertising within apps. Mobile web advertising through banners and in-app advertising constitutes about 80 per cent of the total mobile advertising market. Rich media along with videos is gradually ramping up in the mobile advertising industry, allowing advertisers to run videos on a mobile web page or within a mobile application – referred to as in-app.

 

The mobile advertising market is distributed among the following types of mobile advertisements: Mobile Web Advertising, SMS Advertising, MMS Advertising, Mobile Video  and TV Advertising, In-App Advertising. All mobile advertising spends add up to Rs 230 crore in FY 2012-2013.

 

Vdopia has its own patent technology for brands’ ad campaigns. Brands are looking forward to mobile advertising in order to deliver the brand experience through unique and interactive ad formats. Apart from plain WAP banner ads, brands can opt for more interactive options such as Pre- / Post- / Mid-roll ads, Talk2Me Ads, dynamic skin branding and product placement ad formats. These ads ensure efficient engagements and provide brands with an additional platform to reach out to users with increased interactivity and acceptance. Also, according to monetisation capabilities, brands are assured of reaching the right target audience at the right time.

Vdopia’s own technology and patent products differentiates it from its competitors.

 

Rich media text and Videos are the foremost content categories which have been used by the end users and advertisements that are viewed or consumed on mobile phones or tablets come under this category. These comprise of Mobile Web ads, SMS, MMS, Mobile Video & TV ads and In-App ads.

 

We are currently working with clients such as Samsung, Coke, Microsoft, Nike, Van Heusen, GE.
 

The biggest trends of 2013 will be around Tablet/ipad. We already have capitalised on the increasing tablet culture by introducing VIDEO ad unit on IPADs/tablets. We are currently managing 100 per cent fill through of our inventory. 

 

The product has a complete bouquet of 100+channels. In turn we have been able to generate advertising revenues across multiple clients. The clients in turn have got superb reach and interactivity though the association with NexGTv.

 

We intend to grow even faster. Our product team is working on introducing some more exciting ad units. We will keep on strengthening our partnerships with publishers by driving higher ROI.