EatAds, the Singapore-based startup that’s an online platform for buying and selling offline adverts, has today revealed that it has entered the Indian market. Just as the online ads industry has been revolutionized by such services, EatAds aims to do the same for outdoor and out-of-home (OOH) media.

It enters India with one major company already onboard in the form of Times OOH, which is a local powerhouse in outdoor, road-side and landmark advertising. EatAds already has over 100 media owners listed in Singapore, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Bangladesh, Thailand, and now India as well. The platform has over 6,000 outdoor ad listings.

EatAds co-founder Nigel Hembrow says in today’s announcement:

Being such a large and fragmented country, we had always suspected a need for EatAds in India, and over past months all the India buyers and sellers we have met here have validated this need. We’re excited to be working with our Delhi- based partner to grow our user base in India.

You might recall that EatAds raised seed funding last December. The startup got back into action in October 2012 after remaining dormant for a while as co-founder John Fearon was focusing on building Dropmysite and Dropmyemail. Now EatAds’s expansion is beginning all over again having previously scrapped some of its earlier overseas moves.

After today’s India launch, EatAds is teasing more expansion in the region which will be announced soon. I get the feeling it’ll involve Myanmar and Cambodia or some other market where the outdoor ads industry is fragmented, under-utilized, and somewhat chaotic.

The core EatAds team: Nigel (left) and Dhruv.

From the left – Daniel Armanto (CTO of Adskom) and Italo Gani (CEO of Adskom)

It seems like the online advertising industry in Indonesia is definitely heating up. The fact of the matter is that Indonesia’s digital ad spending is still a lowly one percent compared to overall ad spending, but it is forecasted to have significant growth in the coming years. Understanding that, Indonesia’s Italo Gani (former CEO of ad network Adstars and chairman of InboundID) and Daniel Armanto (co-founder of social network Koprol) are now building Adskom.

What problem does Adskom solve? The current advertising business model in Indonesia demands partner-like ad networks to compete with each other to gain the available ad spots on publishers’ sites (pictured below). There are two problems with the model.

The first, from the publisher’s side, is that when an ad has reached its quota, it gets turned off automatically, and publishers will not earn any money until they activate another ad on that same spot. The second, from the ad-network’s side, is that they have to compete with each other for the ad spaces. Adskom’s first product, which is a form of supply-side platform (SSP) looks to solve those issues.

According to Adskom, with this new SSP publishers can now automate the ads’ back-end, which solves the first problem. Second, now ad networks can have access to all publishers’ ad spots because it is now aggregated by the Adskom system (pictured below).

Furthermore, the system will also calculate the effective cost per thousand views for each network’s ad on a particular publisher’s spot. In that way, both ad network and publisher can optimize the online ad spending and income better. The whole process can be automated, or if the publishers want to do it manually, they can choose which ad from which network they want to show. The SSP will calculate which ad is optimum for that particular publisher. From a lay person’s point of view, Adskom’s SSP will become an alternative to Indonesian website owners having to work with multiple ad-networks.

Adskom is also announcing having closed a seed round of funding from Rebright Partners, a Venture Capital firm in Japan, and is looking to operate mainly in Indonesia and in Singapore. The service will be fully launched in the early third quarter this year.

Italo claims that while the SSP business model is quite common elsewhere, it is still almost non existent in Indonesia and Singapore, perhaps even in Southeast Asia.

In related industry news, a new mobile advertising agency called ad2c opened its regional office in Indonesia.

I met Joseph Edi Lumban Gaol, founder of M-Stars Group, in Jakarta, Indonesia. M-Stars is one of Indonesia’s pioneer mobile content providers; founded in 2000, it currently employs more than 150 staff and has five subsidiaries under its wing (AdStars, VOX, dr.m, PoPs, and m360). Joseph started his career in the mobile scene in 1997 at XL Axiata, one of the largest Indonesian telcos, and rose to become a senior product manager. He held that position for two years and eventually called it quits in 1999 to start out on his own.

His startup journey

Joseph started M-Stars as an application service provider to BCA bank, one of Indonesia’s largest banks. Its service enabled BCA customers to do banking transactions through their mobile devices. That was in 2000 and M-Stars was the first to provide this service. It was not an easy start, Joseph said, because it was extremely tough to get a bank to work with any company, least of all a startup. Nevertheless, he knew he had to get through this barrier of entry to achieve a breakthrough and he came up with a way to do it. He explained to me:

Before I got the bank to work with me, I had an MOU with XL to start this new service as a value added service. With this partnership in place, M-Stars and XL (a trusted telco) then jointly approached BCA to have this service as their new e-banking channel.

As for how he got the MOU with XL, Joseph said he pitched that the telco would become the first operator to launch secure mobile banking for its customers. Plus, working with BCA, who at that point of time had eight million customers, could improve XL’s brand image and set it apart from the competition.

The breakthrough

Despite the partnership with XL and the value proposition being offered, it took nine months before the bank finally agreed to commit. This seems long but it was definitely a worthwhile wait. The partnership set M-Stars into uncharted but lucrative territory that has a high barrier of entry.

However, the partnership did not last long. M-Stars was forced to exit in 2005 as the bank wanted to control the service itself. As it was a forced exit, the terms given were not great. Joseph felt he had to sell his stake in the partnership as M-Stars had little leverage to negotiate for a better deal. He sold the whole system to BCA and cashed out. Luckily for Joseph, prior to the forced exit, M-Stars had already ventured into becoming a mobile content provider to telco companies and had already developed a substantial revenue stream. Without that, the cancelled partnership might have killed M-Stars itself.

After that, M-Stars focused on providing mobile value-added services such as ring tones, music, news, lotteries, etc. At the same time, it partnered with another bank, BNI, to provide a service similar to what it had previously offered BCA. In 2008, Joseph went on to start up VOX, a mobile micro-banking system for phone users in Indonesia that now has 12,000 merchants and around two million people who hold a bank account with them.

Intrapreneurship

Joseph is not a lone wolf, and he also encourages intrapreneurship in his company. Employees are encouraged to think out of the box and given funds and equity if their ideas are good. Companies started up from M-Stars include:

• AdStars, a digital advertising network that focuses on premium publishers in Indonesia.
• m360, a company that provides digital media training services to its clients.
• Dr.M, a service that helps digital record labels and artists manage their digital community, offline fanclub, and promotional activities.
• PoPs, a platform that delivers digital entertainment content to mobile and internet audiences.

Money troubles

A cohesion day at M-Stars

But it wasn’t all a smooth journey. Besides all the red tape he had to struggle with when dealing with banks and telcos, he told me that the finance part of starting up was especially tough. The company depended entirely on him and his co-founder’s savings to operate – which wasn’t a lot. He dreaded payday.

On some occasions I had to borrow money from family and friends when the cash flow was low, especially to pay employees. This was one of the toughest challenges psychologically, as I had to pledge my credibility to them and spend sleepless nights making sure cash flow was positive and that loans from friends and family weren’t defaulted. Remembering those days now still makes me smile.

The founders also leveraged their strong network in Indonesia’s mobile industry and did consulting projects to bring in cash. These projects generated quick cash and sustained the company till it clinched the lucrative partnerships with BCA and XL. His startup finally broke even in its seventeenth month of operation.

Through Joseph’s entrepreneurship journey, I see similarities to many Asia startups: taking up consulting and outsourcing projects to stay afloat while working extra hours to build a product of their own. I believe this approach to being sustainable and having a greater plan for your startup is very much needed for startups in this region as investment and angel funding is not widely available in many parts of Asia.

TV advertisements have proven to work very well for chat apps in Indonesia. China-based WeChat and Japan’s Line have been propelled to the country’s top spots on iOS and Android app stores thanks to their ads. And now Korea-based KakaoTalk is going to make its mark on the country’s TV sets by airing a TV ad campaign in a couple of days. Will the ads be significant in disrupting the chat ecosystem here? Yes, I think so.

Let’s first agree that TV ads do work to gain nationwide visibility and users in Indonesia. The country’s internet penetration is still at a relatively low 24 percent right now, which means that to engage with the other 76 percent of the nation (which amounts to around 190 million people) you need to use more traditional media, like TV. A study by BCG Perspectives shows that “most, if not all, households throughout the country own a television, even those at the bottom of the pyramid of demographic groups, and it remains the most important source of information for consumers. Indonesians trust television commercials.” Line’s and WeChat’s current rankings in Indonesia’s app sites are a testament to that.

But with Line and WeChat airing their own TV ads ahead of the Korean messaging app, how will KakaoTalk’s advertisement beat them? The answer lies with KakaoTalk’s choice of ad stars.

First of the two is Indonesian celebrity Sherina Munaf – who has the country’s second most-followed celebrity Twitter account with five million followers. She’s joined in the ad by Korean all-boy band BigBang, whose 11,000 concert tickets in Indonesia were sold out in a mere fifteen minutes. Those two stars will be able to attract quite a number of fans to try out KakaoTalk. While Line and WeChat are targeting Indonesian teens with Maudy Ayunda and singer Giselle, a great many teens – i.e.: girls – might fancy BigBang instead.

Also, let’s not forget how Korean fever in Indonesia which has inspired a few Indonesian Korean-style pop groups like SM*SH, Cherrybelle, and 7Icons, who have quite a large number of fan base themselves. The number of Korean TV drama series still being aired in the country prove the popularity of Korean pop culture as well. If KakaoTalk’s association with Korea proves to be successful, and Indonesian remember KakaoTalk when they think of Korea, then it will be a big boost.

Of course, Line is tough competition due to its social games or because a lot of friends are already there. Same goes for the full-featured WeChat, with things like voice chatrooms and video calling, especially when those more social features are now available on Indonesia’s popular smartphone Blackberry now.

At the time of writing, KakaoTalk is ranked outside the top 50 spots in both Google Play and iTunes in Indonesia, according to AppAnnie. Let’s see how those rankings will change in the coming weeks.

Singapore-based AdzCentral has concluded a SG$4 million (US$3.2 million) financing round with Electric Sheep Capital and Digital Media Partners (DMP).

AdzCentral in a nutshell provides clients with a one-stop platform for convenient automated digital ads buying including social ads, search, mobile, email, and video. The AdzCentral platform integrates with DSP and trading desk technology to run real-time ad bidding.

AdzCentral platform doesn’t just stop at automated digital ad buy but also includes other ad tech point solutions such as campaign measurement, analytics, visitor profiling, targeting, and optimization to ensure its clients’ ad dollars are well spent, achieving optimal CPM, CPC, and CPA based on real-time data. The entire suite is coined “scientific media buying” by AdzCentral.

To date, AdzCentral has already served quite an impressive list of brands onboard including SingTel, American Express, 3M, Unilever, Standard Chartered, MasterCard, Citibank, and Hyundai. Founder and CEO at AdzCentral, Reza Behnam, told me that AdzCentral has delivered over 1,000 campaigns serving across 100 clients. Behnam commented on APAC’s digital ad market in today’s statement:

APAC and especially Southeast Asia represent an extraordinary opportunity for AdzCentral, where (according to ADMA) digital advertising was worth US$25 billion in 2011.

Prior to AdzCentral, Reza Behnam was the managing director of Yahoo Southeast Asia and also a venture partner at IDG Ventures in Southeast Asia. Juggling his role at AdzCentral, Behnam is also the co-chairman at IAB Singapore, a director at e-payments platform MOL Global, and co-chairman at H2 Singapore Chapter.

AdzCentral first received seed investment from Joichi Ito’s Neoteny Labs, Toivo Annus (founding engineer of Skype), Jayesh Parekh (co-founder of Sony Television Network India), the Chinese Founders Fund, and other undisclosed angel investors. Amid the Series A crunch in Southeast Asia, AdzCentral managed to pull things together, which certainly deserves two thumbs up.

Android monetization platform Metaps has just announced series B funding worth US$11 million. The Japanese startup, which launched in August 2011, helps developers earn money from their Android apps by applying adverts, in-app cross-promotions, or gaining new users from social media sharing.

Metaps’ funding comes from Fidelity Growth Partners Japan along with some existing investors. Today’s announcement explains:

The proceeds from this private placement will be used for securing top talent and growing Metaps service in Asia along with expansion to other countries. The company aims to accelerate business and become the largest Android monetization platform in the world by the end of 2013.

Metaps has been focusing on developers in Asia where Android is (or is close to being) the leading mobile OS – such as in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Metaps now has overseas offices in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Silicon Valley.

A few months ago, Metaps told us that its ad network and cross-promotions had helped drive 10 million Android app downloads and that it has helped some partners make more than $1 million per year from their apps.

The Android specialists got a massive $4.2 million in series A funding shortly after starting up, and that was followed by a minor round of $1.3 million in February 2012 that helped with its overseas push. An anticipated office in China hasn’t yet appeared, where Metaps will be up against some homegrown app-boosting platforms such as Innovation Works-backed Umeng.

An example of Metaps in action in an app.

Baidu’s developers tools are now in English.

All the information for developers is on this new English site, which will be launched officially tomorrow. At the moment it’s quite basic, but Baidu’s director of international comunications, Kaiser Kuo, explains:

Right now, there are only brief explanations about the tools and resources we’re making available, but in the coming months we’re going to make all the documentation available in English to give app developers outside of China everything they need to distribute apps through Baidu.

There’s a definite emphasis on mobile amongst all these developer tools. Indeed, Baidu has been focusing on mobile a lot more so as not to be out-paced by Chinese netizens jumping onto smartphones and tablets. Earlier today we noted that Baidu has seen an 11-fold increase in mobile searches in the past two years. A few weeks ago, the company said it has 80 million mobile app users, using things like Baidu Maps or the Dropbox-esque NetDrive app.

Baidu’s core products remain only in Chinese, but the company has some interests in Egypt and the Mid-East, some apps in Thailand, its Tieba social forums in Vietnam, a badly loss-making search engine in Japan, and a relatively new research lab in Singapore. That last aspect suggests Baidu might be prepping to take its core search engine into Southeast Asia in the future.

Monetizing Android apps in China

As well as making all its tools available to global developers, Baidu is also pushing its third-party Android market, called the Baidu Mobile App Center. The Chinese search giant is encouraging global developers to try out its tools and then also list their apps in the Mobile App Center, which launched in mid-2011. In a country where Android is hugely popular – much more so than pricey iPhones – but local consumers don’t want to be trapped in the entire Google ecosystem, there are dozens of such third-party Android app stores. Between that store and Baidu’s in-app ad platform, it’s amounts to an alternative way for global Android developers to monetize from Chinese users – and it’s a full-on challenge to Google.

One useful thing that developers and site owners might want to check out – once the full resources get translated – is the SiteApp tool which is a neat way of making a mobile website pretty easily.

These days, mobile telcos absolutely love HTML5 as it gives them a chance to be app publishers whilst flipping a middle finger at Apple and Google and their 30 percent commissions on app revenue. That’s partly why Singapore’s SingTel acquired the mobile ad company Amobee last year, and Japan’s NTT Docomo picked up the Italian mobile content company Buongiorno. Today, both Amobee and Buongiorno’s HTML5 app store, called AppsFuel, are coming together in a deal to help developers and content creators monetize their HTML5 web apps across any mobile OS.

The partnership means that Amobee’s ad product PULSE for Publishers is now one of several monetization options for developers on the AppsFuel platform. Amobee promises to maximize mobile revenue by showing the most relevant, contextual ads to users within the HTML5 web apps. In addition, Amobee is now the exclusive mobile advertising agency for AppsFuel, allowing developers to use over eighty ad networks globally as part of this co-operation.

The AppsFuel HTML5 app store. Click to enlarge.

In today’s announcement, the head of AppsFuel, Fernando González Mesones, emphasized: “AppsFuel’s mission is to create a profitable ecosystem for mobile HTML5 developers, and we are ensuring this with carrier billing and now with the possibility of additional revenues via mobile advertising.”

HTML5 won’t magically succeed

HTML5 apps are back in the public eye this week after the full unveiling of the open source Firefox OS and its hardware and telco partners – yes, telcos are especially excited about Firefox OS – at the ongoing MWC event in Barcelona. Big web names like Twitter have committed to full-featured HTML5 apps for Firefox OS – just as Twitter can be found in the AppsFuel store – but that doesn’t mean that consumers will be convinced. As the always entertaining Guardian tech writer Charles Arthur pointed out yesterday, “Firefox OS won’t magically succeed just because it’s open source.” The same is true of HTML5 apps, as people still seem enormously keen on native apps, and so developers need to keep making them and keep losing 30 percent of app sales revenues to Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon et al.

Speaking of SingTel, it buddied up with Japanese social gaming giant GREE for HTML5 mobile game distribution and billing in Singapore. That was part of the launch of GREE’s new HTML5-compatible social gaming platform in November of last year.

While AppsFuel is keen to become the global and unwalled app store of the future, it’s not clear how consumers can benefit right now. Tokyo-based gaming expert Serkan Toto reckons that GREE’s strategy with HTML5 can work for certain types of games in Japan, but it doesn’t look promising or convincing on a worldwide scale.

Let us know in the comments if you’re ready to embrace HTML5 apps on your smartphone.

One of the most remarkable aspects of the economic boom in China has been the overseas property buying spree among some wealthier Chinese citizens. That huge demand is a great business prospect for a number of startups – such as Australia’s ACproperty. Focusing on real estate in its native Australia, ACproperty now consists of a team of ten people, with some support staff based in mainland China.

Mainland Chinese property buyers spent US$28.7 billion on residential property around the world in 2011, mostly snapping up mid-range to high-end apartments and houses as an investment – or perhaps as a home for a child while studying abroad (another huge market in itself). Australia, which has such novelties as a visible sky and safe-to-eat food, is a popular destination for Chinese property purchasers.

ACproperty’s Esther Yong explains to us that the startup also tunes into the Chinese diaspora, with 50 percent of its traffic coming locally (especially Melbourne and Sydney), and the other half, she says, “from overseas, mainly China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia.”

An apartment listed on ACproperty. Click to enlarge.

The site is up against China’s Juwai site, which we looked at last year. But while Juwai has property listings in 33 nations, ACproperty sees its strength in being both dedicated to Australia, as well as based in that country. Esther adds that overseas Chinese investors trust the startup site because “they know that they are accessing the same information as local Australian Chinese” and are not being hit with inflated prices. She adds:

Any Australian agent who’s experienced at dealing with Chinese investors will know that the majority of them will fly to the property destination to suss out the local market before committing to a contract, hence local advertisements are as important. We believe Juwai and us function on a different level: Juwai operates on a more international level, giving Chinese investors a broad range of choices initially, but ACproperty focuses on a more specialised and localised market.

ACproperty came online in 2010 for an extended period of testing and market research and then launched officially in June 2012. The website features extensive search functions for potential investors, and monetizes through advertising.

In order to reach out to prospective mainland Chinese buyers, the company has a presence on Sina Weibo and the whole site is in Chinese. The startup is planning to attend a number of overseas property shows in Shanghai and Beijing this year to further raise its profile.

(UPDATED two hours later: Corrected the section on monetization)

Coming soon to a Chinese website near you.

Last week, we learned of a ban on TV advertising luxury goods in China issued by SARFT that is preventing luxury goods advertisers from reaching their consumers through television (and billboards) during one of the most lucrative times of year (with Spring Festival and Valentine’s Day both traditional drivers of luxury sales). So what’s a luxury advertiser to do? Turn to the internet.

As this Seeking Alpha report suggests, the luxury goods ad ban could be great news for Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU), as luxury brands may turn to the web to get their messages out. Baidu is one of the Chinese web’s biggest advertising providers, and it certainly stands to benefit both in the short term and the long term from this TV ad ban, as vendors who buy successful ad campaigns online will be more likely to stick with web ads in the future instead of returning to TV when and if SARFT’s ban is retracted.

But Baidu is far from the only company that could benefit from a luxury advertising influx. Video streaming sites like Youku (NYSE:YOKU) could also see big bumps as luxury advertisers whose TV spots now can’t be aired move their money into digital video ads. And of course, many of China’s other web portals offer more traditional advertising solutions that luxury advertisers may be interested in. Ads on popular e-commerce sites could see a price spike. Even Baidu nemesis Qihoo could see an influx of cash via ad buys in its search results.

Of course, until we see this quarter’s financial results, it will be impossible to tell just how much of an impact SARFT’s ban has actually had, and who has gotten the biggest advantage out of it. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see a lot of Chinese internet companies, and especially Youku and Baidu, see a numbers bump as a result of the ban. I expect that Youku and other streaming video sites may end up getting the best of this new ad influx, but of course I’m just speculating.

Whatever happens, it’s got to be good news for China’s web ecosystem, and that’s a happy surprise. Usually SARFT busies itself with trying to ruin the internet, so it’s nice to see that for once a SARFT regulation could actually be helping out Chinese web companies.

(via Seeking Alpha, image source)

It’s been a while since we heard from India-based mobile ad platform InMobi, but now we’re told that the company has acquired Britain’s Overlay Media, a data-driven specialist in context aware computing. The buy-up should help InMobi with its targeted mobile ads, since Overlay is all about delivering personalized content to phone users.

The financial terms of the deal haven’t been revealed. The Overlay Media site is now blank apart from the announcement about its InMobi deal. The UK team will move into InMobi’s London office, which is its Europe and Middle East HQ.

Overlay’s main product is its Context Engine which can help developers or brands learn about their mobile users and customers. CNN says that this hasn’t been deployed yet, giving InMobi the chance to have exclusive access to this product which will likely arrive on its ad platform later this year.

Overlay Media comprises of a team of data scientists, and InMobi founder and CEO Naveen Tewari today said of them:

We are excited to add amazing talent to InMobi. This acquisition, along with Metaflow Solutions and MMTG Labs, will help us to continue to be at the forefront of delivering highly engaging content to consumers globally.

InMobi got $200 million in investment from Japan’s Softbank back in September 2011.

We just received word from a representative of Singapore-based startup Sprooki that it will be partnering with YFind Technologies to offer its indoor positioning technology within its mobile, location-based platform. Readers may recall that Sprooki started out as a consumer facing app, but refocused on a white label solution to help shops and other retailers roll their own mobile campaigns.

The partnership with YFind appears to be a logical one. It’s another Singapore based player in the LBS game, with an intriguing mobile technology that uses wifi signals to determine position indoors. The startup raised about $1.2 million in series A funding this past summer.

Sprooki is going to integrate that positioning system into its mobile solution and campaign management platform, offering it to current and future clients. So that ostensibly means an improved offering for malls, department stores, and other retailers both in Singapore and around the Asia region. The director and co-founder of YFind, Melvin Yuan further explained:

A combined outdoor-indoor local marketing solution helps retailers to more accurately incentivize and measure foot-fall. It offers retailers the opportunity to combat showrooming through discrete targeting of offers and rewards based on metrics such as time in store, visit frequency or walk-out behavior.

When we last heard from Sprooki back in November, it had announced that its solution would be used by Singapore’s 313@Somerset mall. The startup also noted that it would be eyeing opportunities outside the country, including the Philippines and possibly Australia. This new agreement will also see YFind make their integrated solution available to clients in other regions such as the U.S.

The world is getting app-ified. Apps are driving the mobile internet ecosystem forward and have emerged as one of the biggest forms of media, entertainment, and utility on mobile. As a result, it is important for developers to devise a successful monetization strategy while they continue spurring the innovation cycle.

Gartner forecasts that the mobile advertising industry in Asia Pacific will grow from $1.6 billion in 2011 to $6.9 billion in 2015, and this presents a massive opportunity for developers to maximize the revenue potential from their apps.

So with that in mind, here are four golden app monetization rules for app developers and publishers to consider:

Rule 1: Deciding the right ad placement strategy

It is essential for app developers to understand that the right combination of ad placement and ad format will be critical in creating a successful loyal user base. The key is to ensure that ads do not impact the user experience of the app. Imagine the app as your favorite magazine. The most impactful spaces in terms of noticeability and maximum revenue generation are the first and last pages, so why not replicate the same tactic with your app? Hence, launch and exit ads are extremely effective, conspicuous, and will yield a higher income as advertisers are willing to pay a premium for it. In addition, interstitial ads which are viewed between game levels or any natural break in the app experience tend to be more fruitful.

Rule 2: Overcoming the billing hurdle

Unlike developed markets, emerging markets like much of Asia have unique challenges. While mobile penetration is more than 100 percent across countries in South East Asia (according to BMI, Q2 2012 and PwC Analysis), credit card penetration is only in single digits. This low credit card penetration accompanied by low GDP per capita means that in-app purchase via OEM app stores would not be a viable monetization model in emerging markets. Users in these markets just do not have the billing mechanism to pay for apps. To overcome this fundamental challenge of enabling users to transact for apps in a hassle free manner, it’s imperative that developers collaborate with mobile telcos and plug into their billing so that users can purchase from the app store utilizing their prepaid balance or postpaid bill.

Rule 3: Going beyond traditional monetization models

App developers need to have an inclusive monetization model for a successful app strategy – one that targets users which are willing to pay for apps (to upgrade features, remove ads, etc) and also consider users (primarily from emerging markets) who prefer free app downloads. A blend of these two will give app developers the best results in terms of reach and revenues. The ideal model is to allow users to download for free – yes, freemium – and start monetizing them via ads. At the same time, allow users who want a premium experience to upgrade within the free app itself.

In this manner the developer gets access to a wide number of users for the app who get monetized via ads and also makes additional revenue from the users who will pay to upgrade.

Rule 4 : Choosing the right ad mediation platform

App developers need to be cognizant of the fact that apps do not possess the same level of flexibility as websites. Once an app is downloaded, the developer is at the users’ mercy for app updates. So if a developer just puts one SDK in their app and it does not monetize well, he is stuck with it. As a result, it is advisable for developers to use a server-side ad mediation platform that gives them choice and control. This platform should also give them an option to add or edit ad networks and generate revenue from multiple ad networks of their preference. At the same time, they need to also get an option to get back fill from a wide range of other ad networks to ensure a high fill rate without the hassle of setting up each individually. Developers should also be able to run cross promotional house ads as it will help them ramp up the next app quickly, while delivering powerful eCPM optimization.

These four golden rules should put you on the path to higher revenues from your apps.

Ashton Lee, Grows China Businesses, @mrashtonlee

Good question, and the answer may differ depending on what you are selling, so I’m going to answer broadly:

• Product - Is it optimized for local tastes? These tastes can also change from region to region, so know who you are marketing to.
• Sales and Distribution – with 1.4 billion people, there is a customer for any product in the world. The challenge is finding the right distribution channels to reach them and knowing how to manage these channels. Traditionally very fragmented, but consolidation and online [sales] have opened the national markets greatly.
• Marketing – [In China] this can be at times lazy. Sometimes, I walk by ads and cringe. Don’t just be a peddler, give people a reason to fall in love with what you are offering. This is changing and is more a legacy of the past when everything was new and you didn’t have to really market very hard – you just had to have the product.
• Organizational Speed – If your organization is slow, you are going to die a fast death. Learn to be fast and react faster to what is happening on the ground, because opportunities in China come in waves. You want to catch it and hold onto it as it’s forming – not only when it comes crashing to the shore.
• Bad Advice - Instead of spending two million dollars on consultants, why not get your product out there and test it out on a small scale. You’ll learn more with real data than with customer surveys (taken by random people at Starbucks). Many foreign businesses get sunk by avoidable bad advice. The market changes so fast here that your six month study is already outdated. A good question to ask potential help is “what have you created and/or sold in China?” If the answer is nada, then turn around and don’t look back.
• All the above can be best dealt with by having the right people on your team. Not just someone who speaks your local language, but people who actually know what they’re doing. Hire as if your life depended on it. It makes a big difference.

This question originally appeared on Quora. More questions on Business in China:

• Why are face to face, in-person meetings, so important when doing business in China?
• Why do so many Chinese, and people from other developing countries, regard real estate as an investment?
• Why do so many Chinese companies IPO in the US? Does China have a deep public market?

The newly-expanded EatAds founder crew: (L-R) Nigel, Dhruv, John.

We’re seeing a great proliferation in online marketplaces in Asia this year, and here’s another one that’s blossoming. Singapore-based EatAds is a marketplace for the buying and selling of outdoor advertising space in Asia and Europe, and it has announced today that the startup has an undisclosed sum of seed funding from Crystal Horse Investments, along with some angel investor backing. Plus, it’s also “currently preparing to raise the next funding round of SG$600,000” (US$493,000).

When we last looked at EatAds in September of last year, it was expanding aggressively across Asia. Now we find that the traditional ads marketplace has listings in 16 countries, including as far afield as the US and the UK.

But the startup admits it was, in its own words, “dormant but functioning” for the last year. Now, however, it is revitalized with two new co-founders – Dhruv Sahgal and Nigel Hembrow – alongside the original, John Fearon. You might recognize John from his startup efforts after EatAds, namely Dropmyemail and Dropmysite, both of which have been growing quickly in the past year – and taking up a lot of his time.

An EatAds representative tells us that the site currently has one office based in Singapore, and will eventually expand overseas.

The revamped EatAds crew believes that the offline ads market is riddled with inefficiencies, and is really hard for businesses to navigate. Nigel points out in today’s announcement that there’s “60 percent occupancy in outdoor advertising in India,” so it’s clearly a broken system. Dhruv chips in to say:

Around Asia, many people don’t know how to buy billboards, who to contact, and what are the prices – there are too many barriers. And in addition we are making it much easier for traditional buying agencies to serve their clients.

Komli Media has announced its second deal in the last five days, this time a sales partnership with Singapore-based hyperlocal mobile ad network Yoose. The deal will see Komli Media’s mobile division use Yoose’s geo-tagging advertising capability for the India and Southeast Asia market. Amit Bhartiya, the VP of Komli Media comments:

As leaders within the digital media advertising space across India and Southeast Asia, our objective is to add a hyperlocal offering into our mix that ensures setting best-practice standards for mobile geo-targeting and engagement, both for our clients and their consumers. We consider the Yoose partnership to be fundamentally important in achieving this and are confident of the significant value this will bring to advertisers across India and Southeast Asia.

Yoose makes use of the geotagged locations shared on mobile phones, allowing ads shown on mobile phones to be more relevant to the users’ location, such as advertising for a fruit vendor 500 meters away. Yoose’s mobile ad feature will also help strengthen Komli’s recent ad sales partnership with Twitter, which was announced last week.

For more information about how Yoose works, you can check out the interview video below with CEO Christian Geissendoerfer.

Today Mumbai-based digital advertising platform Komli Media has announced that the company has signed an exclusive partnership with Twitter. Komli will now take charge of Twitter’s advertising products sales in five Southeast Asian countries – Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and the Philippines.

In this partnership, Komli will be looking to engage advertising agencies across the five aforementioned countries through a series of education and training programs about what Twitter ads have to offer. These Twitter ad products – which include promoted tweets, promoted accounts, and promoted trends – were previously only available to brands in the US, UK, Japan, and Latin America, and are now available through the Komli Engage sales team in the Southeast Asia region.

Akshay Garg, the managing director for Komli Media Southeast Asia, commented on this partnership:

We are really excited to partner with Twitter. Together, we will offer marketers new and relevant opportunities to engage audiences in SEA and drive brand value. Social media growth in this region is among the highest in the world, and Twitter is one of the most recognized and utilized platforms in our region

The Komli team says that Asia is home to 50 percent of the world’s social network users, with 54 percent of Singaporeans and 44 million Indonesians being regular social network users. The team then said that the majority of these growing social network users consult various social media before making purchases. This partnership with Twitter can help advertisers to engage more effectively with these users.

Akshay then explained about Komli’s future plans:

Komli Media will continue to focus on becoming a top three digital advertising business across APAC. On the back of our success with online video and social media we will be adding more ad solutions including mobile. In the coming year, we will be introducing more data and technology platforms to support our ad solutions and help deliver more value for our clients.

This latest partnership with Twitter is great news for the Komli team, particularly for the group of investors that ploughed its money into Komli Media in June. Southeast Asia users can expect to see more localized promoted tweets, accounts, and trends on their Twitter streams with this latest partnership.

When we last heard from the folks at Tokyo-based Metaps three months back, the company informed us that its Android monetization platform had driven 10 million app downloads in the span of just one year. And today the company has an update on its progress, stating that the total amount of participating Android apps have been downloaded 30 million times.

Metaps attributes this success to a strong performance in the Asian region, particularly in Korea where the advertisement consumption growth rates for Metaps’ partner apps was up 2,024 percent for the period of September to October this fall. Readers may recall when we spoke to Tapjoy a couple of months back, they reported a Korean smartphone market that skewed very heavily in favor of Android. So it should come as no surprise that Metaps would find a welcoming market there.

That’s followed by strong growth among the company’s partner apps in China too, which have seen a 864 percent rise in advertisement consumption. Other standout regions in Asia for Metaps partners were Hong Kong, Vietnam (both up 181 percent), and Taiwan (up 161 percent).

All this follows funding rounds about a year ago which helped the company staff a Singapore subsidiary from which it could make this Asia push. According to today’s announcement, Metaps plans to continue business development on a global scale, with a focus on Asia and North America.

Metaps is just one of many Japanese mobile/internet companies that have used Singapore as a springboard to expanding business overseas. We have seen a veritable all-star cast set up shop in the garden city, including DeNA, GREE, Recruit, and KDDI’s ad unit Mediba.

If you are building a consumer internet business, you have probably spent 90 percent of your time on product development, building a team, chasing funding, and defending your decision not to get a “real job” to your mother. If you are lucky, then you spent the other 10 percent getting some sleep. The one area of execution that I typically see Asian startups least equipped to tackle is advertising.

Probably best to ignore Bad Advice Kitty.

As I have written before, there is a dangerous and false notion that products sell themselves. They don’t. Your product will not go viral and anyone that bets the success of their startup on tweets is a fool (and will eventually have to admit to their mother that she was correct). Advertising is to be taken seriously and you need to provision for both investment and time to learn how to acquire and retain customers online. There is no question that startups in Asia have an engineering bias – and that’s a good thing. But we are far behind our counterparts in Berlin, London, New York, and Silicon Valley when it comes to the quality of our UX (user experience) and marketing execution. Today I will focus on paid banner advertising, which is also known as display advertising. (I will cover search engine marketing, retargeting, email marketing, mobile advertising, social, public relations and UX in future posts on TechInAsia).

Online eyeballs

I spent over a decade spending an average of US$20 million a year in advertising for my previous employer (now current competitor). That marketing investment was almost entirely online and distributed into 15 different geographies across Canada, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. Having benefited from that responsibility at a young age I learned a thing or two about online consumer behavior, building a brand online, and of course the ins and outs of digital advertising on a global scale. I also learned that fucking up once in a while was normal, and success in achieving marketing ROI (return on investment) is done through the systematic process of spend, track, learn, adjust, and then scaling the investment when you see returns. Even today, I accept that 70 percent of my teams individual advertising campaigns will either fail or break-even, but it is our job to ensure that the 30 percent that work get the majority of the investment and can scale up fast. It’s not dissimilar to the portfolio theory of a venture capitalist. They know most of their investments will fail but their ability to rapidly identify and ramp up investment in the winners is the name of the game. Treat your marketing tactics and campaigns the same way. Without some level of risk there will be no reward.

When I launched my startup into the very traditional bricks and mortar consumer financial services industry in Hong Kong, I had a theory that it could be built and operate entirely online. I had faith that consumers had evolved faster than the businesses serving them. I saw a disconnect between consumers demands and the stale business models that faced them. This was simply the opportunity. 8 Securities is new company going head to head with huge competitors such as HSBC and Bank of China. If we want to win in the long-term, we have to acquire new customers at scale, add value to their lives and strive every day to make them happy. In 2012 we will have spent approximately US$500,000 in advertising and 100 percent of that is online. Here are some lessons learned and recommendations that that I hope are useful for you.

Tip #1: It all starts with your value proposition

As a consumer internet startup, your paramount objective is to solve a problem for your customers. In doing so, you need to crystallize what differentiates you and precisely how that benefits your customer. Only once you have done this can you begin to think about your message to the market.

Defining your value proposition is no easy task. After nine months in the market we are still refining ours as we are constantly learning from our customers and striving to meet their needs. What we thought might be a benefit often has no resonance with customers, and only by listening do you really understand their pain point and the solution. Your value proposition and your brand have a symbiotic relationship in that one can not live without the other. Your brand is your promise to the customer. Your brand equity is what is left after you subtract your brand’s value proposition with that of your competitors. Marketing can not be effective until you are very clear on how you will position your value proposition in the market and and ultimately in the mind of your customers.

Many of the “marketing professionals” across Asia maintain a false belief that brands can not be built exclusively online. Furthermore, many media planners are still very traditional in their thinking and will advise you that “offline” marketing is a necessity to build brand strength and trust (they also earn more from traditional media). Leave the “offline” advertising to your competitors that are dinosaurs and focus your marketing efforts online where your customers eat, sleep, and breath. With the exception of any public relations you are able to generate in the press or TV, I would ignore the offline channel all together. Marketing in print advertising, outdoor, and on TV is a luxury and certainly not a necessity for a company born on the internet.

Tip #2: Banner advertising and the economics of lead acquisition

The first online banner in history belonged to US telecoms company AT&T. It was hosted on a website called Hotwired and got an astounding 78 percent click-thru rate. The average click-thru rate today is 0.07 percent – and falling fast. Online banner advertising is tough but if you crack the code it will give you a tremendous competitive advantage and a much lower acquisition cost per account than more traditional competitors.

The main advantage of banner advertising is that you can scale it at a rate not always available through paid search. There are three main variables you must optimize when running online banner advertising. First, you need to negotiate a viable CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions) if you are not running a pay per click campaign. Theoretically, an “impression” is defined as each page load where your ad is displayed in front of a real set of human eyeballs. That said, a vast majority of your purchased impressions will not be seen as we have trained ourselves to ignore advertising as we browse content. This is among one of the biggest factors why we have seen click-thru rates plummet.

Many online properties where you will want to advertise still operate on a CPM basis and that includes Yahoo. For the sake of this example, let’s assume you negotiate a CPM of $5 on a site that generates quality traffic that you would like to target. If you invest $5,000 then you are purchasing one million impressions for your ad.

Second, the quality of your advertisement is critical. The most common mistakes are banners that try to convey too much information, don’t have a clear call to action, or don’t visually stand out from the background. We usually find that we have to change our messages and creative two or three times before we get it right. In terms of media, your creative can span simple flash all the way to expandable video ads. We have run a number of video based campaigns on Yahoo and LinkedIn (one of the first in Asia to do so) and saw a CTR (click-thru rate) of over one percent. Most of the videos we ran would drive interaction from over 50,000 unique visitors, but that of course is all a function of our investment level.

The benefit with video is that it’s a more effective medium to grab attention, to tell a story, and build your brand identity, but it comes at a greater cost both in terms of production and the media buy. For the purpose of this example, lets assume we run a standard three rotation flash banner. Let’s assume we beat the average and can achieve a CTR of 0.10 percent. If you invest $5,000, you have purchased one million impressions. If 0.10 percent click on your ad then you will have generated 1,000 unique visitors to your landing page (also known as the campaign page).

Finally, you need a great landing page on which your sole goal is to convert the visitor who clicks on your advertisement into a qualified lead or user. Don’t make the mistake of sending your leads to your home page as you need to isolate their experience to the objective at hand. The conversion rate of visitor to qualified lead really depends on your specific business and the information you are capturing. That said, you should aim for a minimum of 15 percent of your visitors to convert.

The fundamental elements of a great landing page are:

1. Your call to action and design elements must be consistent between the landing page and the ad that was clicked. If the experience is not seamless and logical then your visitor is lost.

2. Have a very clear headline and body copy. You must tell your visitor what it is and what you want them to do. If you are not promising to solve a problem for them then they have no reason to stay and will bounce off.

3. Don’t over-engineer your online form to capture lead information. Make it as simple and clear as possible. If you don’t need their mobile phone and home address then don’t ask for it. Keep it to a minimum and ideally just just ask for name and email, or use social log ins. Don’t forget to clearly highlight your privacy policy if you expect their trust. A simple “We promise we won’t share your email” will often suffice.

Plus, here are ‘101 Landing Page Optimisation Tips’ from one of the brightest minds in the business – so there are already no excuses for getting it wrong.

In summary, we have invested $5,000 in our example to generate 1,000 visitors to our landing page with a minimum goal of converting 15 percent, or 150, of those visitors into qualified leads or users. This results in a cost per user of $33. Do you expect the lifetime value of your users to be greater than $33? If so, the investment makes sense. Know your ROI and constantly optimize your lead funnel as there is always room for improvement.

Tip #3: Tracking and optimizing your advertising investment

Anyone that knows me would be right to say I am crazy about analytics and data. I have invested a great deal of time testing hundreds of tools to measure the entire life cycle of our customers from the point of advertisement to engaged customer. We currently track the specific advertising source that a customer clicked on and bind it to the customer’s activity so we can assess in real-time the revenues ultimately generated by the specific ad, the channel, and the campaign.

There are no endorsements here, but I wanted to lift the hood for startups so you can see what marketing systems we run. We use MediaMind for our ad serving platform. From this platform we host and deploy our banner ads across different websites and geographies. On a daily basis we track CTR, conversion, and revenue metrics on the specific ads and campaigns we are running. We are constantly optimizing our media mix based on this data.

To track interaction on our landing page and website we use Google Analytics. This provides invaluable insight in terms of how visitors are engaging and navigating our store front. Tools such as CrazyEgg provide a deeper real-time heat map so you can optimize the layout of your page.

The most important tool I use when it comes to lead acquisition and conversion tracking is MixPanel. MixPanel provides event driven funnels based on your defined flow. In our case, we measure leads from the point they arrive on the landing page through each of the six steps of our online application. I can see specifically where customers may drop out of our online application and work to make the process simpler. Once we generate potential customers online, we use Salesforce to auto route the prospect to the appropriate sales person based on language, geography, and product experience. This of course increases the sales conversion rate as you are matching customer needs with the person best equipped to help them.

We use Salesforce as our end-to-end CRM system. As a transaction-driven business we measure our revenue and core business metrics in an OLAP (online analytical processing) tool called MicroStrategy. For pre-revenue startups you can very likely tackle this manually until you reach a point of scale where it makes sense to invest in automation. Rather than waste time logging into all of these systems I publish them to the entire office in real-time through a dashboard called Geckoboard. As they say, you manage what you measure.

Focus on these three core areas and you will be running very effective and performance-driven online banner campaigns in no time. Remember, be prepared to take risks and accept that failing fast and pivoting is a normal part of the marketing process.

Yesterday, it was announced that Singapore startup NoiseStreet and SPH MediaBoxOffice have partnered to launch a smartphone-based solution that aims to bring a new level of engagement, interactivity, and immediacy to what’s called out-of-home advertising (OOH) – ads in stores and on the street.

The smartphone-based solution, also known as Noise Street, is part of the drive to make screens a two-way medium, instead of a one-way platform. Noise Street claims to be a one-of-its-kind in Asia, allowing consumers to be engaged with advertisements, and enabling them to play games on their smartphones in order to receive rewards and benefits on-the-spot.

Edward Tang, SPH MediaBoxOffice’s general manager, explains:

We’re committed to bringing leading-edge innovation to our advertisers. This partnership with NoiseStreet allows retail advertisers to increase footfall and sales, and brand owners to create a unique engagement with consumers.

Using Noise Street’s custom analytics, retailers are able to tailor future marketing promotions to suit their customers’ preferences, such as tracking redemption rates, promotion-linked in-store sales, and the level of user engagement during the promotion period. They are also able to select from a ready-made set of available games developed by Noise Street or design a customized one.

In a recently concluded pilot promotion with bubble tea brand GongCha, it is said to have attracted new customers with good redemption results. Customers at the participating branch played a ‘Guess the Drawing and Win!’ game, which could be played by scanning a QR code in the mall’s foyer. With the correct answer, consumers could proceed directly to the mall’s GongCha outlet to redeem their rewards.

Anyone can take advantage of such promotions, provided they have an internet-enabled smartphone. No apps are required.

NoiseStreet : Engage your audience .. from NoiseStreet on Vimeo.

Baidu leads the pack in China with its ad platform. At the end of 2011, data from Analysys International says that Baidu has the greatest market share in the online ad sector in China, at 30.5 percent of the industry’s revenue. E-tailer Alibaba is second with 17.4 percent, and Google’s remains third despite a shrinking proportion of the market:

Baidu’s share of the market grew very slightly from 2010 Q4 to the end of 2011. Mr. Wang’s confident predictions suggest the company is looking to stretch its lead again in 2012.

But not everything is going Baidu’s way this year, with a major new search engine emerging in the form of Qihoo’s 360 Search. The software maker looks to have taken some market share from Baidu as well as Google. However, for the moment, Qihoo doesn’t have an online ads platform.

[Source: Reuters]

China is a country of impressive numbers, but when it comes to technology adoption, it is still behind most of its Asian neighbors. As we all know, global advertising is increasingly dependent on digital platforms and technological innovation to convey engaging and targeted messages to consumers. This is the challenge advertisers in China will have to face over time should they want to make an impact in the local market.

Unlike other developed countries, China has had a late digital start but the past decade has proven that the Chinese are hungry to catch up and position themselves as technological innovators. The recent announcement of Miao Wei, head of China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) mentioning that delivery of 4G licenses will be brought forward to 2013 illustrates this desire to strengthen its position in the connectivity race. Furthermore, companies such as Tencent (with its QQ IM, and WeChat app) or Sina (which runs the Twitter-like Weibo) have already established themselves as global players and leaders of the digital evolution that is taking place in China.

China’s high internet and smartphone adoption rate, and 401 percent market growth in 2012, has pushed most first-tier city inhabitants (Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, etc) to the forefront of a fully interconnected mobile internet world. With this in mind, let’s picture Shanghai 10 years from now and what a typical day in the life of an upper-middle class Chinese person might be.

Meet Da Ge. He is 32 and married with a young daughter.

7:00 AM: Da Ge’s phone alarm linked to a smartphone app goes off, turning on his favorite morning playlist, with all sound directed to his side of the bed as his wife doesn’t wake up till later. His phone also turns on the water heater at a preset temperature for his shower.

7:15 AM: China becoming increasingly environmentally conscious of its limited natural resources, he scores Eco points based on the amount of water used while showering. The less water used, the more points he accumulates that entitle him to discount prices for an apparel brand that is sponsoring the app that measures these ‘eco points’. Entering the kitchen, the room light automatically comes on. Using voice control, he is able to activate a wall projection screen and chooses the divided screen display option with one half showing his favorite Youku channels and the other his schedule for the day (7).

8:02 AM: Leaving the house, he puts on a pair of recently acquired audio AR glasses which link to his mobile and listens to his favorite Weibo feeds. While waiting at a traffic light, he witnesses a car crash, which he films with his glasses. China has improved its mobile Internet connection considerably over the past decade, enabling him to instantly feed snippets of the video to his Weibo account. This year, Weibo is one of the primary digital platforms used by brands in China because it has consistently enhanced its offering for advertisers by adding relevant ads at the end of user-fed videos. Da Ge’s recently posted video of the accident concludes with a German car ad. Into the subway he goes…

8:14 AM: Getting into a subway car, he sees an ad for a new badminton racket on a 3D screen – he gets excited! Thanks to his phone’s social integration and improved GPS signal, some of the ads he comes across are based on his interests. Waiting for the subway, he chances upon an ad for chocolate. He interacts with it, using a network ad app on his glasses. He now sees AR chocolates flying in his direction and needs to grab as many as possible in 10 seconds to get a discount coupon link. It’s a win, free chocolates for the family tonight!

8:56 AM: Opening his office door, he receives a personalized greeting; the company server records his time of arrival and sends a signal to his coffee machine. A hot sugar-free cappuccino is already waiting for him when he sits at his desk. He gets a low coffee supply notification on his phone. Re-order? Yes please!

12:00 PM: After a busy morning, the first hunger pang strikes. Not sure of where to eat, he types “lunch today” in Baidu, and gets localized results ranked by recent reviews made by his friends. Putting the full potential of the semantic web to use, China’s leading search engine has become much more relevant and transparent over the years. However, still uninspired, Da Ge sends a voice message to one of his contacts working in the neighborhood. Amy’s free and suggests a good restaurant he’s never been to! He gets directions and the approximate duration it takes walking there displayed on his glasses.

3:30 PM: Back at work, Da Ge attends a real-time telepresence conference with Europe that is controlled by a virtual keyboard projected on their meeting room table.

6:55 PM: After work, he heads to his favorite hot pot restaurant and meets with four friends there. They choose their dishes directly from an interactive table they are sitting around. Once ready to settle the bill, brief multiple-choice questions on their overall satisfaction are asked via the table screen. They can skip these queries of course, but can get 10 percent off the total bill if they respond. Da Ge kindly treats everyone and pays directly through a mobile payment app that links wirelessly with the table. The app also offers suggestions of places and products he might be interested in based on his previous mobile purchase.

9:30 PM: Da Ge hails a cab ride back home. At the back of the driver’s seat he watches a small Touchmedia screen displaying interactive ads. This screen has a micro camera that not only keeps the driver informed of what is happening in the back of his cab for security, but it also determines the approximate age and sex of the passenger and so the ad agency feeds ads in accordance to the retrieved data.

9:45 PM: At home, his wife and daughter are watching the Lancôme branded web channel on Youku. Being a leader in branded text web content, Lancôme quickly understood the power of dedicated web channels. Viewers comments are displayed live on the side of the screen. He joins them and altogether they engage with the compeer and audience of the show, by using their mobile to send live feeds.

11 PM: After a productive day, Da Ge heads to bed, ready for another digital tomorrow.

So that was Da Ge’s day. Now, back in the moment, we see signs of much of that already. Take the most recent Yihaodian virtual supermarkets for example, this digital tomorrow is spreading like wildfire in China. If it remains behind on some aspects of the digital realm, very few will be left in the dark because of the growing interconnectivity of technology there. All examples mentioned above represent the undeniable evolution of existing technological innovations, which advertisers will need to understand in order to grasp the full potential of digital advertising in the next decade. Furthermore, the recent news of earlier 4G licenses for China, suggests that super-speed mobile connectivity could hit China as early as next year.

Agencies have already begun the shift towards digitally driven marketing strategies. Yet, if they hope to position themselves as leaders within the industry, they will have to think ahead and create more dedicated digital research departments. They will have to grow from being digitally savvy to tech-savvy in order to provide unique interactive content and work hand-in-hand with platforms developers and hardware providers, to reach out to Chinese customers in more innovative ways.

photo: phileweb.com

We’ve written a lot about QR codes recently, especially with Chinese application WeChat using them creatively as part of social chat platform. But here’s another exciting new data transfer technology from Fujitsu (TYO:6702) that sends information to your smartphone in a very different way.

This new technology uses your smartphone camera to scan video being displayed on your television, and then transmits embedded information to your handset. The folks at Diginfo news have a good video explanation of how it works below [1]. The technology reportedly depends on imperceptible changes in the light, as well as digital watermarks.

At a glance, this technology looks like it could change commercials forever. There would no longer be any excuse for any company to not include a TV-to-phone coupon in their television ad spots. Since most of us are conditioned to tune out during commercials these days, this could be a much-needed incentive to sit up and pay attention again. It could be a win-win for both the advertiser and the consumer.

Check out the video below, and let us know what you think.

It’s just over three weeks until Chinaccelerator 2012 officially graduates its newest flock of startups, but we’re already seeing some of the incubated businesses get going. One of these is AdConnect, whose AppSpree is an app cross-promotion network for small startups. For now, the service is free.

Co-founder Andrew Boos is originally from Toronto but is now busy honing AppSpree at Chinaccelerator HQ in Dalian, Northeast China – but the startup will eventually be based in Beijing with its five current full-timers.

Andrew pitches AppSpree as “a zero-cost way to help apps grow” as an alternative to its “expensive or opaque” larger rivals. It has the full array of stats and an analytics dashboard that developers need to see how the cross-promotions are benefitting their apps. Coming later, says Andrew, will be “substantial targeting” of ads and “full cost-per-action” options for things like acquiring new Weibo followers. Essentially, he says, it’s “an [ad] impressions swap – totally costless” and “less intimidating, more simple” for younger startups to use. “We’ll keep it free up to a threshold,” Andrew reckons.

Connecting apps and sharing users

AdConnect’s AppSpree will focus on Chinese apps, and will soon have more options for cross-promoting by app genres, regions, and language.

“The tricky part is behind us,” says Andrew, as all the service infrastructure is now done, and the website has just gone up in both English and Chinese. The next step is to get developers on board whilst also meeting with investors and practicing for the Chinaccelerator demo day on October 31st. He admits that there’s just one app developer signed up so far, so a few more fledgling apps from “growth-related startups” are needed to get the network moving.

It’ll be up against Chinese ad platforms like Guohe, or Innovation Works-backed Umeng. But Andrew identifies Papaya’s AppFlood as closer to what they’re working on – albeit with a different model.

Expectations will be high for the Chinaccelerator 2012 graduates. Of last year’s batch, OrderWithMe quickly went on to win TechCrunch Disrupt Beijing, and then the funky Piktochart made a strong showing at our own StartupArena Singapore contest earlier this year. We’ve already looked at one of this year’s Chinaccelerator chosen ones, WeiboAgent, which is a a SaaS advisory tool built on top of social media analytics for Sina Weibo, China’s hottest Twitter-esque service.

So if you have a burgeoning app on iOS or Android (with support for WP coming later), reach out to AppSpree and perhaps join its network.

Here’s a fun new application from the folks at Toyota (NYSE:TM), which aims to make the mundane process of charging your phone into a fun game.

The app is called ‘Plug-in Championship,’ and the object of the game is to wait until the moving gauge on your screen is full until you plug-in your phone to its charger. Depending on how full the meter is, you’ll be assigned a score and ranked along side global competitors.

Admittedly, this is not going to be a game that you’ll spend hours and hours playing. Maybe not even more than a few minutes. But if viewed as a marketing campaign for Toyota (the company is promoting its electric Prius PHV), then it looks a little more interesting. As you can see from the production value of the promotional video below, the company has clearly dropped a lot of money on this campaign.

This is not the first time that we have seen Toyota promoting its brand with an online game in this manner. Readers may recall that the company created a Facebook game last year called Social Network Racer to promote its FT-86II concept model. And the fact that Toyota is taking this route again, is one indication that the strategy might be working.

Plug-in Champtionship is available for iOS and Android.

Unless you have been living in the jungle, by now you should know that Youku (NYSE:YOKU) and Tudou have already merged as…eh…Youku Tudou (it’s not the most creative name ever). And that merger should give the sites more impact as an advertising platform because the traffic numbers are bigger and the effort to monetize is also more concerted. There isn’t a need to fight for ad dollars between Tudou or Youku now because all the clients will go under one roof.

Plus, according to a release sent to us (citing iResearch data), there is little overlap between Youku and Tudou with only 14 percent daily overlap and 18 percent weekly overlap in users. As a combined entity, Youku Tudou could reach as many as 310 million unique viewers each week and generate 1.6 billion hours of video each month.

While ads usually just mean banner ads in Western or Youtube terms, ads could well mean an awesome/entertaining video on Tudou or Youku. Unknowingly, I recently caught one video which talks about how a handsome dude was rejecting girls in the office for lunches just because he hates girls with lots of make up. Only one girl stood out because she looked the most natural. I wouldn’t have guessed that it was even an ad until the ending. But I didn’t mind as that video was seriously quite entertaining.

We are back with a new issue of our Thai tech round-up, brought to you by thumbsup. This time let’s focus on digital advertising, and the Facebook-backed hack contest.

First real-time bid advertising in Thailand

Click to enlarge!

MCFiVA, a digital agency in Thailand, has launched its latest product to digital marketers, providing a service to buy and sell online advertising in real-time – claimed to be the first of its kind in Thailand. It uses the familiar real-time bidding (RTB) system, and is called “FIVIAD”, says Dr. Supachai Parchariyanon, managing director of MCFiVA Thailand.

This new service has a buy and sell system similar in concept to the one used in stock market trading. Also, advertisers can reach their target groups directly without specifying particular websites. Advertisers get direct control of their ad budget, and better optimization; consumers should see more relevant ads.

FIVIAD has opened only for existing customers at the moment, giving them early access whilst also gathering useful feedback. The agency has set a target for FIVIAD of bringing in 100 million baht (US$3.25 million) in revenue within this year.

Thai team wins Facebook Dev World Hack in Jakarta

A big event for developers, the Facebook Developers World Hack, dropped in on Jakarta, Indonesia, on September 13th (one of ten city-stops). The winning team here was actually from Thailand, named Computerlogy (pictured right).

Computerlogy is a startup based in Chonburi province which develops web apps for banking and enterprise, as well as some social media apps and tools. The company’s main social product is SocialEnable, which is a solution for monitoring social media.

Computerlogy has been familiar with Facebook and its APIs for some tine, being the only company in Thailand that’s a Facebook ‘preferred marketing developer’.

This Facebook-sponsored World Hack competition runs through to October 1st, and still has lots more cities to visits. The three main topics at this year’s event are mobile, gaming, and open graph.

Kingsoft shows off the app-by-app settings for mobile ad-blocking in its controversial SafeApp.

Ad-blocking might be routine for some people on laptops and desktop computers, but a new way to block in-app mobile ads is causing uproar in China. The new Android-only app, made by anti-virus firm Kingsoft (HKG:3888), is called SafeApp and effectively suppresses ads that appear within other Android apps on your phone. Almost inevitably, makers of in-app advertising platforms in the country are crying foul, and an alliance of 19 ad firms and app developers has issued a statement calling on SafeApp to be stripped of this ad-blocking function.

In-app mobile ads are a crucial revenue source for many app developers, especially with the trend for free games supported by adverts. The group’s letter, dated September 14th, is signed by some major Chinese developers such as Punchbox, makers of Fishing Joy, and local ad platforms like Domob.

Kingsoft’s SafeApp, which requires root privileges on the Android device, is not the first to do this, and Android tweakers worldwide can do the same, also after rooting their phone, via other means such as the open-source AdAway tool. Both AdAway and Kingsoft’s free app are in the Google Play store.

Kingsoft’s reasoning for blitzing mobile ads might be hard to justify if this comes down to a legal battle, since the app’s name in Chinese – Shǒu Jī Dú Bà – literally means “mobile virus master,” so it’s making an illogical leap between ads and malware. Sure, viruses are a particular problem in the Chinese Android ecosystem where piracy, and even maliciously-modded free apps, is a rampant issue, but an app that shows ads is not inherently unsafe.

China’s Kingsoft has been around since 1989, and has more recently been making a big push into Android apps with utility tools and anti-virus products. It also makes the Kingsoft Office suite for mobile word-processing.

SafeApp is free, but in the Chinese language only, if you want to give it a try.

[Source: 21CBH - article in Chinese]

Photo: japan.internet.com

Here’s an awesome web promotion from the folks at Uniqlo and Bic Camera in Japan. In order to publicize their upcoming joint ‘Bicqlo’ store in Shinjuku which is set to open on September 27, the two companies have released a really fun game entitled Bicqlo Vader. And it’s pretty awesome.

For anyone who enjoys these kind of Space Invaders style games, you may try your hand at getting a high score in this outer-space shoot-em-up. If you play in your browser, it’s a Flash game — and even though it spun up my laptop’s fans pretty quick, it was a lot of fun to play. The game can connect to your social networks (Facebook and Twitter) so I expect it will be shared quite about around the interwebs.

Surprisingly there is also an Android version (see screenshots below), with an iPhone game coming soon as well.

It seems like an awful lot of effort to promote a single store, but then again, elaborate web and mobile promotions are nothing new for Uniqlo. Readers may recall the company’s recent promotion that used Pinterest to create an amazing animation. Similarly, its Uniqlo Wakeup app was also surprisingly pleasant, making the process of waking up not entirely terrible! [via japan.internet.com]

Anuj Khanna Sohum, speaking at Startup Asia

For anyone who attended our Startup Asia Singapore event back in February, you will likely recall our informative chat with Anuj Khanna Sohum, the founder and chairman of Affle Group. Affle is a mobile company based in Singapore with a range of products including messaging, mobile ads, and mobile content.

The company recently announced a partnership with Yahoo India for mobile advertising in India, which will see Affle selling the latter’s mobile advertising inventory on smartphones, feature phones, and tablets. Yahoo is said to have over 70 percent reach over the internet audience in India.

Anuj Kumar, Affle’s co-founder and CEO [1], noted:

[G]iven the significant growing base of mobile internet users and smartphones in India we are really bullish that rich ad engagement on premium destinations like Yahoo! would be the key catalysts to drive rapid growth of the mobile ad market.

Similarly, it was just over a year ago that Affle landed a partnership with eBuddy [2] to gain exclusive rights to sell its mobile ad inventory in India.

Readers may remember that back in October, Affle raised $10 million from D2C, a Japanese mobile ad agency.

Sina Weibo’s advertising department has just announced on Weibo that it is currently testing a new ad product, called “Fans Headlines.”

Fans Headlines ensures that the promoted message will be shown at the top portion of the Twitter-like Weibo stream to all of the advertiser’s fans. The promoted message will only be shown once within 24 hours – a relief to folks who hate ads. Once the promoted message is seen, it will move down the stream just like any other Weibo message.

Companies using the Fans Headlines ad product will be charged on a cost-per-fan impressions basis. Currently, there are already some companies using the new product as beta testers. I’m pretty sure this won’t be the last ad product introduced by Sina Weibo, which last week silently dropped the beta tag from its logo, probably signalling that its product and users have matured – and the social network is now ready to go full throttle on monetization.

[Via friends at Techweb]

One of China’s leading mobile advertising companies, Guohe Ads, has a new product out this week that’s aimed squarely at enabling the cross-promotion of mobile games. Called Mix, it’s the startup’s big play for the gaming ads market in the country. Speaking to TiA from Guohe’s Beijing office, CEO and co-founder Neo Zhang explains that the “gaming category is growing very fast in China” and that it wanted a product especially for such cross-promotions because “developers care about their games so much” – and so Guohe felt it deserved a dedicated service.

Guohe Mix was launched at the start of this week after a month in beta testing. Devoted to iOS game developers (for now), it already has some major local studios making use of it, such as Red Atoms, makers of the cartoony Three Kingdoms-era game you see being promo’d in the above image. What this new promotional platform does is display a large, almost fullscreen frame which is standardized in size. It’s large and bright, and Neo claims that it can seriously convert a lot of users.

For gaming studios who decide to utilize Guohe Mix, Neo says that the aim is to make it more than just a product. Refering to Guohe’s base package, the Ad Manager, he says: “We’ve built a community on top of Ad Manager […] for developers to cross-promote, exchange users.” And so the idea is that the gaming-only platform is more tuned-in than its rivals which cross-promote many kinds of apps.

Where game developers pick out other games for cross-promotion ads.

To back up his claim that the large gaming ads convert better than ones from local competitors, Neo explains it in three keywords: “Audience, context, and experience.” That means, in terms of Guohe Mix: you know your audience is into gaming; the ads you show them are relevant; and the large display area gives a good experience and enough details to lure someone into a new game.

Previously, Guohe had been focusing on serving mainly as an aggregator, allowing app developers to “make money from 20+ ad networks at the same time, such as from Madhouse or Admob.” Then it launched its Ad Manager for mobile devs to host, target, and schedule their own ads.

Guohe is facing off against other cross-promotion platforms in China, such as Innovation Works-backed Umeng. Whilst acknowledging that Umeng has been around a while longer, Neo says that the differentiation from Guohe Mix is its giving developers more scope to choose in which other apps to cross-promote (there are blacklists available), and that also, “In Guohe Mix there’s a community – and trust in the community.” Plus, of course, it focuses totally on games.

Guohe’s SDK and platform is iOS only for now, but Neo reveals that they have made an Android version but have held it back for the time being – until, he says, the Android ecosystem in China is a bit more ripe for monetization.

See the details (in Chinese) on the new Guohe Mix product page.

Japanese online service provider Excite recently launched its advertising-based points program called Excite Points, claiming to be the first of its kind user reward system in Indonesia. We talked to Nobu Kiyohara, the manager of Excite business development group [1], about the company’s expansion plans in the country.

We understand that in the last year, Excite Japan has started to look to expansion into other Asian countries, notably Taiwan and Indonesia, with the Philippines next in sight. In Taiwan, Excite has invested in two companies: e-commerce platform PCHome, and women-oriented review site Fashion Guide. Nobu added that they also tried to expand to China, but it was hard for them to identify the right market there. Should its points system prove successful in Indonesia, Excite plans to bring it to the Philippines next.

So how do Excite Points work? As shown in the above graphic, users login to the website and earn points through online activities, such as clicking a banner, subscribing to Groupon, getting a quote from an insurance company, or making purchases. Basically, it’s gamification. The points can then be redeemed for prizes at the Excite Points website.

At the moment, the program is still in the testing phase, and so the redemption options are only in the form of SmartFren phone credit top-ups. To provide more redemption options, Excite is looking to partner with Indonesian telcos Telkomsel and Indosat in the next couple of months. Excite also plans to add other products such as gadgets and more merchant’s products in the future.

The points are funded by the advertisers, or whoever sets the online activity. The company will pay Excite based on CPA (Click per Acquisition) according to what the advertisers want, like sending a quote on new auto insurance, for example. Excite explains that the CPA method offered by the program makes more sense than the usual CPC (Cost per Click). This is because the latter doesn’t guarantee that users complete the advertiser’s target activity even when they have seen and clicked on the ads, as explained on the following slide:

Nobu claims that Excite Points advertisements are better than Google Adsense and Adwords in acquiring potential customers. Google can help you acquire customers, he says, who are already interested in the product, according to user search keywords and content. While Excite Points can help acquire potential customers who might not even know about the product. The points program can introduce products to new customers who are actively seeking to earn points on the website. Of course, I’d personally say that each method has its own strengths and weaknesses.

On the Indonesian Market and Foreseeable Problems

Right now, Excite is looking to expand aggressively into the Indonesian market with its points system in terms of users, but especially advertisers. Nobu added:

Honestly speaking, the advertisement market is still small in Indonesia. I believe it’s 6 billion ad dollars including TV, traditional media, and online media. Online media consists of about only one to two percent of the whole market, but it’s growing. We are anxious to go into this market and become a game changer.

Nobu revealed that in Japan the 15-year-old points-based business system has encountered problems with “point hunters.” These are certain users who only look to get points without giving any real tangible benefits to the advertisers. A lot of point hunters even go to the extent of making multiple accounts to get the points. Should that happen, Excite already has the technology to maximize the system’s effectiveness. One such example is that Excite can submit a weekly report regarding user CPA, and then the advertisers can approve or disapprove the users regarding the point rewards. This is already implemented right now.

Whereas many other Japanese companies tend to go by themselves into new markets, Excite sees partnerships with the local major conglomerate Sinar Mas Group as its strength and differentiator here in the country. Nobu believes that together with the partner’s local knowledge and Excite know-how, they can execute and deliver the products well.

Excite doesn’t have an entity yet in Indonesia, and the team consists of four to five people located in SmartFren’s office at the moment. Nobu explained that one of the reasons why Excite chose to partner up with the carrier is because the company has data and access on active PC internet users in the country. Excite has also partnered up with mobile CPA network giant Adways Indonesia, and that should help them in the market as well.

Somehow over the years ‘advertising’ has become a dirty word in the startup community. Why invest in paid advertising when your amazing product will generate network effects and go viral? After all, you are armed with Facebook, Twitter, Weibo and your awesome blog where advertising your product is free. This has become conventional thinking in many startup pitches.

I don’t mean to sound like a jerk but the reality is your product is probably not as good as you believe and only three people are consistently reading your tweets (and one of them is your best friend). There is a dangerous and false notion that products sell themselves. They don’t. You and I probably are not building the next Instagram or Pinterest so lets get serious. In my experience the old adage “it takes money to make money” is usually true. From day one, you should build your startup with a balance of great engineering, design, user experience and online distribution. Fall short in any one of these areas at your own peril.

There is no question that there is a place for social promotion and inbound marketing for any startup that needs to build awareness. In fact, I believe every startup should start marketing this way. Generating your own press, writing a blog, and social outreach are a must. After all, it is imperative to understand your position in the market and how you will present your brand and value proposition. There is no better way to do that than listening to early customer feedback. This only takes the investment of time and an open mind.

My position is that relying solely on inbound marketing is not enough. Barriers to launching a technology startup get lower every day and that naturally drives more competition who are fighting for your target customer’s attention. Furthermore, you are going to find the coming years more challenging to raise capital from external investors. Believe me when I say that customer ‘traction’ is going to be a prerequisite for them. Pointing to page views or app downloads is not enough, more and more investors want to see real revenue traction and you need real paying customers to achieve that.

I strongly suggest provisioning investment for online search and display advertising to supplement your PR, social, and content marketing efforts. Online advertising is highly performance-based, it’s measurable – and when done well it simply works. In Asia, your traditional competitors are likely investing in traditional media. Let them have it. You have a chance to own the online channel so take it. Learn the fundamentals of search marketing, display advertising, retargeting, and landing page optimization. Blogs such as Kiss Metrics, Hubspot and SEOmoz will teach you everything you need to know. Any startup that can master online distribution has a real advantage over a technical team that only builds product.

I believe paid advertising fell out of favor as the lean startup movement gathered momentum. The lean startup approach is smart. The idea of building a minimal viable product, getting early and frequent customer involvement, and iterating makes total sense. I was living in Silicon Valley in the year 2000 and in hindsight the startup scene was completely out of control. Technology was obscenely expensive, development teams were huge, releases were few and far between and companies were spending millions of dollars in the name of building a “brand.” ROI (Return on Investment) did not seem to be in anyone’s vocabulary at that time.

That said, there is a happy medium. Startups are building and deploying products smarter and faster than ever before. But never underestimate the positive impact of smart paid advertising. You are making investments in product development, in people, and in time. Don’t make the mistake of believing customer traction is the natural result of building a great product. Customer traction is the result of building a great product and making customers aware of why they need it. As always, good luck and I am pulling for you. I leave you with this quote from Steuart Henderson Britt:

Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing, but nobody else does.

Japanese mobile gaming company GREE (TYO:3632), or more specifically, its subsidiary GREE Advertising, today is announcing a partnership with French mobile affiliate network MobPartner.

For developers on the GREE Platform, this will bring new promotion tools and user acquisition services courtesy of MobPartner and its network of mobile affiliates (see chart below from GREE). The CEO of GREE Advertising, Tatsuhei Asanuma, noted in the announcement:

By matching MobPartner’s mobile ad capabilities and ad network with GREE’s expanding global reach, developer community and user base, we’ll be able to help deliver new products faster, and to more people than ever.

While MobPartner is a French company, its reach is indeed global claiming to extend to 100 million users as of this March, and with a network of 100,000 publishers.

Earlier today we also heard that GREE is one of three new members of the Entertainment Software Association, in addition to China’s NetDragon and Mad Catz Interactive.

BMW makes use of Sina's new "Weibo promoted ads" platform.

Chinese web portal Sina (NASDAQ:SINA) has been having a hard time making money out of its popular Twitter-esque site Weibo, and a report suggests that the next monetization step will be putting ads in the form of promoted tweets (yes, as Twitter is doing) in the timelines of Sina Weibo users (pictured above).

The ad product has been confirmed by a Sina representative to the Chinese blog Techweb, but there’s no timeframe for its official launch. The new social ads are called “Weibo Tui Guang” – literally: Weibo Promoted Ads – and the system is currently in beta testing with brands like automaker BMW and Chinese online travel agent Ctrip (NASDAQ:CTRP) already signed up and helping Sina to test them out. The promoted ads will carry the latest tweet from the participating brand, and they’ll show up at the top of a user’s timeline on the Weibo.com site – and perhaps in the official Weibo app too – before floating downstream.

It’s not clear how targeted these ads will be. For example, could a certain brand reach out only to users in a certain area of China, or only to users of a certain gender? That would make the new Weibo ad product a good way of giving social media followers some useful localized deals or information.

Sina Weibo has proved to be the hottest and most buzzed of the Twitter clones in China, soaring to 350 million registered users earlier this year. To offset its huge running costs – not least in terms of the amount of media censorship that authorities are requiring of it – Sina has been piling on features such as optional VIP memberships and a social gaming platform.

[Source: Techweb - article in Chinese]

Nokia pushing its new WP7 devices, like the Lumia 800, in China. (Images: Techinasia.com)

The mobile ad platform AdDuplex has released new stats that suggest that China is now the second-largest nation of Windows Phone (WP) users in the world – despite Microsoft’s new mobile OS only launching officially in the nation in March of this year. The figures show that China appears to be home to 14 percent of all WP enthusiasts, according to collated ad impressions, behind only America’s 26 percent share:

Though this is no measure of sales, it’s interesting that China’s share of hits on the WP-exclusive AdDuplex platform has more than doubled since the same stats were looked at for January 2012. Even at that time, a couple of months before WP7 even rolled out in China, the country was still in joint fifth place with six percent:

Microsoft is boasting that its WP OS has over 2,000 Chinese-made apps ready for users, so they won’t miss out on one ounce of QQ-ing, Weibo-ing, or Taobao-ing. Plus, Nokia’s good-looking Lumia 800 and 900 models are piquing the interest of local phone buyers – but we’ll have to wait a while to see some hard and official sales figures.

AdDuplex was founded by Lithuanian-born geek Alan Mendelevich, and is an in-app cross-promotion and ad platform.

[Source: AdDuplex blog]

Anonymous Analytics – the research wing of the hacker collective Anonymous – has produced its second-ever report [1] on a Chinese company. This time Qihoo 360 (NYSE:QIHU), the anti-virus vendor and web portal operator, comes under intense scrutiny. The group alleges that “Qihoo’s massive traffic volume is a lie.” And since most of Qihoo’s revenue comes from the ads and links it sells on its link aggregator site hao.360.cn, Anonymous Analytics is effectively saying that the whole company is a fraud, and recommends that the US SEC investigate and delist the Chinese company.

It’s not the first time that Qihoo has been lambasted. Last year, the short sellers Citron put the boot into Qihoo, making similar claims of exaggerated traffic stats and ad revenue. But Citron didn’t have any evidence. Anonymous Analytics, however, claims to have found a smoking gun:

Several months ago, our team discovered a piece of code embedded in Qihoo’s directory page. This code was voluntarily placed by the company so that comScore, an independent third-party auditor, could accurately measure the true traffic volume to the site.

We waited patiently – with hopes that management would release the results of the traffic data to corroborate Qihoo’s claims of massive traffic activity. They never did. In fact, two weeks ago, the code that allowed comScore to measure the traffic volume was quietly removed – as if the whole thing had never happened.

As a result, we mobilized our team and acquired the comScore data ourselves.

As detailed in this report, management chose to keep the data secret because it shows irrefutably that Qihoo’s directory page gets significantly less traffic than management has led the capital markets to believe. All that massive traffic volume that was supposed to transform Qihoo into an internet marvel doesn’t exist.

Qihoo was supposed to be the next great internet company. It turns out that it’s just another fraud.

And so, from a mixture of analysis of possible earnings from clicks and other revenue sources – like online gaming – and that missing comScore code, Anonymous Analytics is “absolutely confident that [Qihoo] management is wildly exaggerating earnings.”

That comScore tag in the code on hao.360.cn disappeared on or around June 20th. In the full report embedded below you can find screenshot evidence, says Anonymous, of its appearance and vanishing. As for why Qihoo would do this, the report notes on page 15:

It’s unusual for a company that deals predominantly in advertising space to quietly add and then remove a comScore tag after only a few months of activity. We can think of no positive reason for such a covert move. Neither could a representative from comScore when we called them.

When asked if they knew any reason someone would remove their tag, the representative answered that “[the company] probably didn’t like what they saw.”

See the full report embedded below, for a non-too-flattering background on Qihoo CEO Zhou Hongyi and some other alleged antics by him in previous companies. The new attacks will undoubtedly tarnish Qihoo’s image yet further – already sullied by suspicion of its 360 Safe Browsers’ dirty tricks, and the way Apple temporarily suspended all its iOS apps over manipulated app store rankings. It remains to be seen if the markets will react this morning to the news, which was released moments ago at 11am EST today.

[UPDATE 14 hours after publishing: Well, that hurt. $QIHU closed down 7.5 percent at the end of the day's trading].

I confess, I have yet to find any kind of personal reason to use Pinterest. But I have been impressed by a few companies who use it creatively. The Wall Street Journal for example, has a clever pin-board for notable quotes from its articles. But Japanese clothing maker Uniqlo’s recent effort to promote its dry-mesh lineup of t-shirts is pretty snazzy too.

The idea hinges on pinning really tall images. I mean, super-tall. Images that change on a gradient as you go from top to bottom, or images that change in pattern or content as you scroll down. It’s almost like a moving film strip in a way. The result is impressive, and I encourage you to go check it out for yourself. But do make sure you have four columns of pictures, because if your screen is too wide, it won’t look right.

Uniqlo has always been known for sharp design, particularly when it comes to its web properties and online promotions, and this is no exception. The company also recently created Uniqlo Wake Up, an app that varies its wake up music according to the weather. The musical voices of the wake-up lady is oddly pleasant too. The company is recently making a bigger effort to break into the US market, and these promotional efforts are a just a small part of that.

As for Pinterest, it can likely look forward to more Japanese companies taking notice of it in the near future after Japanese e-commerce company Rakuten led its last round of funding.

[Creative Review via @hicais]

This is great news for all phone app startups out there, as Indonesia has an impressive developing market for both smartphones and feature-phones. Smartphone impressions grew by a remarkable 123 percent, showing a faster rate of growth than the feature-phone market at 93 percent.

In terms of Indonesia’s OS market share, Nokia OSes (33.4 percent) and Symbian (22.5 percent) stay as the top platforms in Indonesia, though they are slowly losing their share to Android. Android has the strongest growth in the last one year with a strong gain of 8.3 percent share in terms of ad impressions, now reaching close to 10 percent market share while both Nokia OS and Symbian OS are slowly losing their shares by -1.0 percent and -5.3 percent respectively.

In terms of the top devices based on their ad impressions share, Nokia still dominates Indonesia with 56 percent. The five most popular devices all come from Nokia as well, led by the X2-01 with 4.6 percent.

Phalgun Raju, InMobi’s regional director and general manager for Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan noted:

Indonesia continues to show strong growth rates as one of the most mobile-centric markets in this region. Smartphone adoption will continue to ramp up quickly – with Android leading the way – allowing brands even more creative and engaging opportunities to connect with their audiences.

Here is the infographic in its entirety:

For more fun graphics like this one, check out previous entries in our infographic series.

Japanese social gaming giant GREE (TYO:3632) has launched its global website aimed at audiences outside of its home country, with its ‘Come Play GREE’ tagline being used to promote its lineup of mobile social games.

The company will be spending $50 million on an ad campaign targeting US audiences, where it has already launched titles like Zombie Jombie, which has topped a million downloads, Alien Family, and its first Android title Dino Life.

You can check out GREE’s promotional video below.

Meanwhile on Mobage

It should be noted that while GREE is pushing hard to win over North America, the folks at DeNA have been making more inroads into the China market over the past six months, with a number of high profile partnerships under its belt already.

At home in Japan, DeNA has a clever promotional video of its own, a short TV commercial for its popular Rage of Bahamut game. It’s a really fun clip, one which I hope they can adapt for western audience (or even just subtitle it) as it reminds me of the old Godzilla monster movies.

[Via Pocket Gamer]

The Mumbai-based digital advertising platform Komli Media has just announced its fourth round of major investment – and its biggest to date. The funding round is worth US$39 million, and was led by Norwest Venture Partners. Also taking part were Nexus Venture Partners, Helion Venture Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Western Technology Investment.

In a press release to announce the funding, Komli Media revealed that the cash “will be used to invest in the company’s core media technology platforms and to expand its presence across the Asia Pacific region.”

Komli hails its integrated coverage of digital display media – with a focus on mobile ads, and its social ad platform – as being key to its success. In updated stats, the company reveals that it now has more than 5,000 clients on board, “reaches over 270 million users monthly, and actively services more than 1,000 advertisers” across Asia (APAC). It says it’s riding the wave of data-enabled phones and smartphones in the Southeast Asia region to hit ever greater numbers of ad impressions.

To mark the biggest-ever backing from Norwest, the VC firm’s managing director, Niren Shah, explained the attraction of Komli:

We are very pleased with the exceptional work done by the leadership team in driving growth and establishing Komli Media as the leader across APAC. With early investments in superior talent and its innovative platforms, the company has completely transformed its business. Today, it is well positioned to capture a much larger share of digital media within some of the fastest growing markets in the world.

Komli Media has busy splashing the cash recently, acquiring mobile ad network ZestAdz last summer, and then snapping up Admax Network earlier this year.

In the afternoon session for our Startup Asia Jakarta 2012 event, we were delighted to hear from Yazid Faizin and Pandu Wirawan, the founders of mobile and web ad network Adstars. They were interviewed by Willis Wee, and here are some of the highlight points of their talks:

#14:47: We started in May of 2010, and we built it because many intl players were coming to Indonesia, so we tried to build local inventories, we saw big inventories of local websites.

#14:49: (On competition) Adstars is one of the biggest in terms of inventory, I’m not sure about revenue, but it’s one of the biggest. We have 1.3 billion impressions combined across web and mobile. Mobile has huge traffic, about a billion and for web about 300 million.

#14:51: (On turning points) The first (few) months to get 10 million impressions was easy. But our turning point was in our first year, bloggers told friends about the network and that’s how we got a lot of traction.

We were lucky, I started selling when I was in Admax, and after I joined Adstars (that experienced helped). The work is fun and we have a great team. We’re like a family.

#14:55: We will resign to start a new company. If you are entrepreneurs, and we wil stil have a share of adstars. But we’re hoping to be a next level of entrepreneurs. Adstars was fun but we want to grow. We think it’s time to delegate and let others run Adstars, and then follow our dreams.

#14:57: We have a couple of companies right now. [With a laugh, indicates a Singaporean startup that starts with ‘G’. Moderator Willis guesses Gushcloud, and they note they are hoping to bring Gushcloud into Indonesia.]

#14:59: A lot of startups in Indonesia try to build on smartphone platform, but that only has a small percentage of the mobile users. So there’s a huge potential in feature phones. For us in our mobile network we have small traffic in local inventories, so I think there’s a lot of potential on feature phones. Mig33 has a lot of success here.

#15:01: There are only two companies in Indonesia which are quite successful in feature phones, and that’s Mig33 and (TMG’s) Kotagames.

#15:03: Mig33 is doing well selling virtual items, but we think that banner advertising is a good way to make money on mobile.

#15:04: I think it’s important for entrepreneurs to have a dream. But it’s also important to try to collaborate with other startups, and if you a team try to build your team and trust them. Don’t try to do it just by yourself. We believe in our team and we try to work with other startups.

This is a part of our coverage of Startup Asia Jakarta 2012, our startup event running on June 8 and 9. You can follow along on Twitter at @startupasia, on our Facebook page, on Google Plus, or via RSS.

According to a report from China Daily, India-based mobile advertising company InMobi intends to be China’s “best mobile advertising provider” by the end of the year.

InMobi moved into China last year, and currently has offices in Beijing and Shanghai. And with over a billion mobile users, China certainly is an attractive market.

But as vice president and managing director of InMobi Asia Pacific, Atul Satija, points out, the Chinese market is a very unique one in that it is really fragmented with a lot of different app stores, particularly in the Android space, as we have pointed out before. But while Chinese consumers appear to download a ton of apps, the amount of apps they pay for is relatively small (see iOS figures for China, free vs paid).

However it’s important to note that this sort of consumer behavior might actually create an opportunity for InMobi, as more mobile developers might turn to supporting their free apps with advertising. That’s where InMobi hopes it can fill a need in China. The report cites the company’s CEO Naveen Tewari as saying InMobi already reaches 63 million smartphone users via 13,000 mobile applications so far.

Can they reach their goal by 2013? We’ll have to wait and see.

The company has been busy in recent months, launching its new mobile ad tracking platform a month ago. Back in March, InMobi set up an office in Thailand where it sees a rapidly growing mobile market as well.

At an event this afternoon in Singapore, Yahoo (NASDAQ:YHOO) has rolled out a whole bunch of advertising platform products for the first time in Southeast Asia. The mobile-oriented ads are, says Yahoo, multimedia, interactive and well-targeted. They launch immediately in Singapore, and will come to Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam “in the coming months.”

Yahoo reaches over 200 million folks across Asia as a huge publisher of content, and it’s that kind of captive audience that it’s offering up to brands today. And so, for the first time in the region, the somewhat beleaguered U.S. web company is making available three of its key ad products:

1. Clickable mobile video ads – These tap-to-video ads can take over an entire screen or expand to certain sizes, working within phones and tablets. Yahoo claims they they “encourage consumers to interact” and “outperform traditional video ads by 3:1.”

2. Smart ads – These can be optimized for each user, and could include something like hyper-targeted local offers. These initially launched way back in 2007.

3. Targeting ads – Lastly, Yahoo’s targeted ads can reach select groups or demographics “based on interest and content consumed within Yahoo.”

The focus on mobile by Yahoo is understandable since home internet penetration across Asia as a whole stands at a fairly low 24 percent, compared to mobile penetration of 74 percent – with many of those phones being used online.

The Japanese advertising agency Dentsu (TYO:4324), which is one of the world’s largest advertisers, is expanding its reach even further having just announced that it’ll open an office in Singapore tomorrow. The new digital agency in the country will be called Dentsu Mobius, and is being set up with SG$6.3 million (US$4.89 million) worth of backing from Tokyo HQ.

The Singapore office will be headed up by two managing directors: Angeli T. Beltran, who’s also the executive regional director at Dentsu Asia, and James Hawkins. They’ll oversee 30 employees at Dentsu Mobius. The new office is being described as a “specialist digital agency” that will be at the center of the company’s digital business in the region. That includes the likes of Dentsu’s Facebook ad sales deal, which was recently extended when Mark Zuckerberg dropped in to the Japanese capital.

Dentsu’s corporate communications manager in Tokyo explained to Tech in Asia:

Interactive communication is one of Dentsu’s strengths, and the establishment of Dentsu Mobius will allow us to blaze new trails in the mobile advertising markets of Southeast Asia.

Singapore is the latest stop on Dentsu’s journey of overseas expansion. It already has 168 offices around the world in 28 countries. The company has also been enlisted by compatriot GREE in its bid to take its mobile gaming platform around the world.

Online book publisher Bookboon.com is based out of London, but with sales offices in India, China, Hong Kong, and Singapore it is looking to make a strong Asia push. Specializing in academic texts, business books, and travel guides, the company says that in the past year it has seen over 1.5 million downloads from Asia.

We asked how that breaks down across the region, and we’re told that for the first four months of 2012, the company’s download figures are most dominated by India, but with many users in Indonesia, Singapore, Japan, and South Korea as well. I’m told that Bookboon sees downloads from a wide range of universities in Asia, including Indian Institute of Technology Kanput, Institute of Technology Bandung, Singapore National University, and the University of Tokyo, just to name a few. The company’s CEO Kristian Madsen noted:

Many business professionals and students have an e-reader or tablet, with our wide selection there is something for everyone. This year we expect 6–8 million downloads in Asia.

What’s interesting about the service is that the ebooks are offered for free, with ads occasionally served up in inside the ebooks. Downloading books does require you to sign up for Bookboon’s weekly email newsletter where the company announces new book releases. I’m not a fan of this sort of pre-requisite, but I guess it is a small price to pay for a free book. A representative also assures me that your email address will not be shared with third parties.

The books themselves come in PDF format, which for me, is far from the ideal file format for an ebook. I’d personally love to see them offer ePub or even make it available in HTML [1]. But I expect that in many of the emerging markets where BookBooon is growing, PDF might be a good fit.

While the company offers books in an assortment of languages, for now it only has English books for Asia. Currently it offers over 1,000 titles, which you can browse over on Bookboon.com.

Photo: k-tai.impress.co.jp

A while ago we wrote about a concept game design that conceived to integrate games into the straps that passengers grip while standing on trains. And while that sort of thing might be a while off, a company in Tokyo is currently testing out a way to advertise with these straps using NFC.

Shunkosha currently has FeliCa NFC-enabled straps installed on the Ginza and Marunouchi train lines for a trial period which started yesterday, and will extend to June 3rd. Users simply need to touch their phone [1] and obtain the embedded URL for the website being promoted by the ad campaign. For now, the travel agency HIS will be the advertiser in this initial phase.

It looks to be a process marginally easier than scanning a QR code, although I wonder how many people will actually use it after the novelty has worn off.

I still think that gaming might be a better way to advertise to people than by sending them to a URL. Perhaps some kind of real-life card collection game, where you can only obtain certain cards in specific locations as with the Japanese location-based game Colopl.

That would certainly be something I’d like to see the Japanese Tourism Agency get behind, for domestic tourists as well as those from overseas, especially Korea and China.

In any case, if you’re on the Ginza or Marunouchi lines in the next week or so, be sure to check out these new strap ads, and let us know what you think.

Shunkosha (pdf) via Wireless Watch

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) announced today that Pixel Media will be the exclusive advertising representative for Skype in Hong Kong.

Skype will now be available as an advertising option for online and mobile advertising, and advertisers will also be able to reach other Microsoft properties, says Leslie Chu, the company’s general manager of advertising in Hong Kong and Taiwan:

We’re excited that advertisers in Hong Kong can now be part of the Skype experience. By including Skype into MSN, Windows Live Messenger and Hotmail, we are able to offer advertisers unparalleled reach across very intimate and unique communication platforms.

Pixel Media’s CEO Kevin Huang noted that his company is pleased to have been selected by Microsoft, pointing out the importance of a platform like Skype in the digital advertising landscape in the region. In addition to Hong Kong, we’re told that in the Asia region, advertising is available on Skype in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, and Japan.

Indeed it was just last year we when saw Japanese advertising agency Dentsu sign a deal to be Skype’s exclusive advertiser in Japan, that particular agreement focusing on display ads in the “Skype Home area,” for Windows only. This partnership with Pixel Media, we are informed this afternoon, is also for the Windows platform only.

The announcement also notes that the destination resort Galaxy Macau is the first advertiser to get on board.

I always admire gutsy and hardworking entrepreneurs, and it is not hard to meet one in Indonesia. Two of them who I’ve come to know are Yazid Faizin and Pandu Wirawan. They are the founders of Adstars, one of the earliest mobile ad networks in the country.

As we learned last year, the company generates more than 500 million ad impressions each month. It’s an impressive stat and the founders have worked really hard to reach it. I heard from other friends in startup circles that both entrepreneurs are obsessed with their startup; to the point that they could miss out on meals, working until their bodies couldn’t take it but minds were still going strong. It isn’t big news that entrepreneurs can be hardcore workers.

But that level of commitment is pretty intense. For Yazid and Pandu, it is called “passion to drive things further, better.” You got to admire that. Of course, you never want to work at a level that threatens your health. For kids out there, please don’t try this at home.

But their efforts did pay off, thankfully. In just a couple of years since launch, Adstars became profitable. In fact, I learned that its annual revenue is in the millions [1], although I couldn’t pry the exact figures from the founders. Adstars continues to grow and thrive today. Folks I’ve met in the advertising industry in Indonesia usually have great things to say about the mobile ad network.

I’m extremely glad to tell you that they will be sharing their startup journey at Startup Asia Jakarta on June 7, from 2.30 – 3.00 pm. The session will be titled “From Zero to Millions in Revenue.”

This coffee chat should be insightful and fun. Yazid and Pandu will also reveal their next venture at the conference. Both are tightlipped about their next startup, but I’m sure it will be something interesting, and given their track record, profitable too.

See you at Startup Asia Jakarta, folks! Stay tuned for more previews on our agenda.

[Image: Brad W. Foster]

It was just a couple of months ago when California-based ad company Amobee was acquired by SingTel for $321 million. Now today there’s word that Amobee is itself acquiring Adjitsu, which is a 3D mobile advertising business developed and owned by Cooliris, the folks behind LiveShare. The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Cooliris has long been known for dazzling 3D photo gallery displays. And its Adjitsu 3D advertising graphics look just as slick. Products displayed in 3D can attract far more user interaction, as you can see in the demo video below. Here we see a Nokia Lumia 800 phone being turned and then viewed from multiple angles, and color changes are toggled with controls on the side.

Amobee’s CEO Trevor Healy commented on the acquisition, and why Adjitsu’s 3D ad displays stand out:

Creating mobile ads with an immersive 3D experience fundamentally changes the way people perceive ads. Instead of a passive experience, mobile users now interact and play with the ad, which is key to starting a love affair between the consumer and the brand. […] With AdJitsu’s advanced 3D technology, Amobee’s mobile ad campaigns feel like mini apps that mobile users look forward to receiving.

Personally speaking, I wasn’t even aware of the fact that Cooliris had branched into this kind of business. Indeed this small, standalone business unit was only just spun-off by Cooliris in 2011. It’s certainly a practical use of 3D technology, in contrast with other 3D experiments which may have gone bust.

Mobile advertising network InMobi has launched its new mobile tracking platform, which it says will enable advertisers to measure conversions in mobile web and app campaigns.

The company’s VP of products, Chandrashekhar Vattikuti, noted that in the business of analytics solutions, its not quite so important to be the ‘first mover,’ but rather it’s best to ensure that an accurate and scalable solution be delivered to meet customer needs. This is what InMobi hopes it has done with Ad Tracker:

[It] uses browser cookies to track conversions across apps and the mobile web as the primary conversion tracking technology. It also combines ODIN1 and market referrer tracking technologies for app download campaigns. By using multiple tracking technologies, it is able to produce the highest level of accuracy and scale that is possible through mobile devices.

In its announcement, the company notes that Ad Tracker does not rely on UDID [1], going to for more forward looking strategy free from any worry of UDID depreciation. It’s new solution is cloud-based, entirely separate from the InMobi ad network, and “completely free to integrate and use.” Users can define goals like downloads, registrations, or payments in a real time dashboard view. There is SDK integration for iOS and Android apps, as well as javascript integration for mobile web.

Leading up to this release, InMobi had issued a number of reports last week containing data and insights about the mobile web in various Asian regions. It’s good to see the company add more tools to its repertoire, especially ones that are more open and accessible for others to use like this latest one.

Note: This article was updated to remove “Singapore-based” from the title. Inmobi is based in India.

“Mainland Chinese property buyers spent US$28.7 billion on residential property around the world in 2011, generating over $900 million in commission for professional property sellers.” So says the blurb on the website of Juwai.com, which lists international property for Chinese buyers. And that’s both the enticement for its advertisers as well as an indication of how the startup could be sitting on a goldmine, as Chinese investors look set to nearly double that global property buying spree to a forecasted $50 billion by the end of 2012.

Juwai – which means “home overseas” – claims it is the number one property portal for Chinese who are searching for international property. The consumer-side of its website is in Chinese, featuring house and condo listings from 33 nations; while the client-side is in English, allowing agents to load-up their listings with basic property details, a photo, and a position on the map (pictured below right). After a bit of translating on the part of Juwai, prospective Chinese buyers can then browse the houses and call a toll-free number or send an SMS to move things forward from there.

Click to enlarge a view of a property page on Juwai.

Overseas property has become very attractive in China for a number of reasons: weaker foreign currencies make them cheaper recently; it’s one of few overseas investment opportunities available to Chinese; revenue from renting out; or as a home for a child who’d study overseas; as a safety net in case China becomes unstable; a future retirement home outside of China’s polluted cities; and many more factors.

Juwai claims that, for advertisers, it can give much greater exposure for their property for a fraction of the price of a magazine ad spread, or attendence at a propery exhibition – another growing phenomenon in the country recently as real estate companies market to mainland Chinese buyers. The website is headquarted in Hong Kong, with two bases in Guangdong, southern China, as well. The same is true of rival startup sites Arisingland.com and Propgoluxury.com.

Real estate is a huge deal on the Chinese web, with major web companies like Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) and Sina (NASDAQ:SINA) seeing their property portals as key traffic drivers. But China’s Soufun.com (NYSE:SFUN) has made the biggest killing in this area with its ad-strewn site dedicated to apartments and villas in every city in China. And although Soufun is one of China’s hottest tech stocks and the country’s seventh-largest ad platform, it has not adapted to the trend in overseas house buying that really took off in 2009 when lower overseas house prices coincided with confidence that China was going to avoid the worst of the global economic downturn.

Juwai, however, is riding the trend, and is a Chinese startup to watch seriously this year.

[Spotted via 17startup - article in Chinese]

As you can see, Amazon has erected fake shipping boxes with Amazon’s familiar logo around a few of the pillars in the Guomao station, and probably elsewhere as well. It’s pretty eye-catching for people who ride the subway a fair amount; it jumped out at me immediately that something was different. And I’m impressed that they spent some time thinking about a creative way to advertise that interacts with the advertisement’s surroundings, instead of just slapping up a bunch of posters. Although admittedly they have also slapped up a bunch of posters elsewhere in the station. Still, though, it’s pretty cool.

I wasn’t the only person to respond to it, either. During the short time I was waiting for the train, I noticed it was getting quite a bit of attention, and one young man even walked over and hugged it. Sadly, it was just as my train was coming and I wasn’t able to get a photo. But if people are hugging your advertisements, you know you’re probably doing something right.

(Yes, I suppose the guy could have been a plant, but I don’t think so. He only hugged it for a second, and then he jumped on the train too. If it was a viral stunt, it was pretty poorly orchestrated; I think it was just a guy who really likes Amazon China.)

Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) DoubleClick Ad Exchange service has launched in China, giving local businesses a new online advertising option to choose from. DoubleClick was bought by Google back in 2008, and is only now coming to mainland China. The platform allows users to get real-time control over their web ads, including very targeted ads and dynamic audience or platform selection; it’s a part of Google’s broader Ads Display Network.

The US search giant removed it servers from mainland China in March 2010 and at the time shuttered its Google.cn search engine. But its offices and ad business remained in place in Beijing and Shanghai. Despite its now Hong Kong-based search engine losing a lot of market share in China, Google has insisted that its online ad network is thriving in the country.

Google’s China country manager for media and platforms solutions, David Chen, announced the DoubleClick roll-out on the company’s local blog (which is, lamentably, blocked in China along with the whole Blogspot domain). In an official translation provided by Google to Tech in Asia, David says:

[T]oday we’re excited to announce the launch of DoubleClick Ad Exchange in China, a step towards creating a more open display advertising ecosystem for everyone. The Ad Exchange is a real-time marketplace that helps large online publishers on one side; and ad networks and agency networks on the other, buy and sell display advertising space.

To explain the Doubleclick value proposition, he borrowed an analogy from the airline industry:

[S]ome publishers are left with up to 80 percent of their ad space unsold. It’s like airlines flying with their planes mostly empty. And for the ad space that they do sell, publishers also have to deal with the complexity of managing thousands of advertisers and campaigns.

Google’s main online ad competitors in China include the rival search engine, Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU), the e-commerce giant Alibaba, and the web portal Sohu (NASDAQ:SOHU).

Photo: communication-solutions.tmcnet.com

Twitter announced today that it has rolled out brand pages for companies in Japan, following up on the feature’s initial launch in the US last December. The first companies to get branded pages in Japan will be mobile carrier NTT Docomo (@docomo), Lawson’s convenience stores (@akiko_lawson), and Warner Entertainment Japan (@warnerjp).

Branded pages include wide header images, as well as custom stylings like logos and taglines. You can also promote a selected tweet to the top of your timeline, and many brands have used this real estate to pin promotional videos. There are more details about this over at fly.twitter.com.

Now, branded Twitter pages aren’t quite like branded Facebook pages. Given the amount of third party interfaces there are for Twitter, it’s uncertain how many people actually see these fancy branded pages. I know I very rarely browse Twitter using its web interface, and I’d imagine that many other users are the same.

According to The Next Web, the branded pages require that you have $25,000 already in Twitter’s ad ecosystem. I’m not certain if that stipulation applies to Japan as well or not.

Figures from Semiotics claimed that Twitter had about nearly 30 million Twitter accounts at the beginning of this year. That’s just behind Brazil at number two. As you might expect, the US is listed as having the most Twitter accounts online with 107 million as of last January.

Who’s next in line to get branded Twitter pages? Brazil seems like the most logical choice, but both Indonesia and India are big Twitter nations as well, and might also be among the next countries to get the feature, assuming it doesn’t soon get a global roll out.

[Via the always excellent @Akky over on Asiajin]

XM Asia Pacific Pte Ltd announced that it has acquired PT Magnivate Group, one of Indonesia’s most successful (if not the most successful) digital and social media marketing agencies. This move will help extend XM’s reach to one of the largest advertising market in Asia.

Magnivate, which will be renamed as XM Gravity, will still be led by the CEO and founding partner Kevin Mintaraga. With around 100 people employed by XM Gravity, they are going to maintain their market leadership with global and local clients such as Danone, Unilever, Frisian Flag, Samsung, and Indofood. Founded in 2008, they have reached a total of 3 million brand fans today. Kevin Mintaraga commented on the deal:

This is the opportunity for our people/talent to have regional exposure and to support XM Asia regional expansion plan. In the near future, XM Indonesia office will take on an important role in XM’s regional growth plan, especially in social media marketing space.

According to Kevin, the average growth rate of digital advertising businesses in Indonesia during the last four years is around 90 to 100 percent per year, with digital advertising taking a 3 to 4 percent chunk of all Indonesia advertising expenditure. The estimated size of Indonesia total advertising expenditure in 2012 will be 9 to 10 billion USD, which will only bodes well for both XM Asia and XM Gravity.

Kevin Mintaraga also added his comment about his “exit” for the company he founded:

I am grateful to fulfill one of my career goals, but more importantly to have achieved this with partners and a team who always go an extra mile together. It’s simply a priceless life experience. I don’t have any specific advice from my experience, but one thing I realized that it takes passion and a dream to step on the first stone — but it takes commitment and attitude to finish the race.

Alibaba's ads in action on its ad platform page.

New stats just released by Analysys International show the online ad market in China expanding once again, with Alibaba and Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) showing the most growth, while Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) China advertising market share shrinks back further.

The Q4 2011 online ad market share – calculated by revenue – shows that the never-ending boom in e-commerce, coupled with Alibaba’s leadership of it in the B2C (Tmall) and C2C (Taobao) sectors, means that Alibaba’s aggressive ad platform push has resulted in 49 percent growth year-on-year, now standing at 17.4 percent. That’s the strongest proportional growth.

Baidu’s online ads account for 30.5 percent of revenue, up slightly over the previous year. Analysys International puts this down to a government push to get small- and medium enterprises (SMEs) online and engaged with internet search marketing. Google remains in third, now ebbing down to 6.5 percent. Sohu has remained stagnant year-on-year.

Sina saw a significant loss of market share, indicating that its traditional web portal has weakened its ad platform; plus, it doesn’t seem to have capitalised on its social success with Sina Weibo in order to turn that around.

Soufun might be the only unfamiliar name to readers. It’s a heavily-trafficked real-estate web portal, carrying mostly ads for housing developments.

Here are the Q4 2011 stats in contrast to the same period a year before:

[Source: Analysis International for Q4 2011 and Q4 2010]

Last year we told you about California-based Amobee, an ad company which was making a strong push into Asia, opening a new headquarters in Singapore back in June, and partnering with companies like MCM in Indonesia, and Ambient Digital in Vietnam. But today there’s big news from SingTel (ASX:SGT) that it has signed an agreement to acquire Amobee for about $321 million [1].

According to the announcement, Amobee’s management team will “remain in active control” of the company. Trevor Healy, Amobee’s CEO commented on the deal:

We are delighted to partner [with] SingTel to continue our leadership in mobile advertising. SingTel and Amobee have a shared a vision of the future of mobile marketing and by leveraging each other’s strengths, we will be able to advance the industry on a global scale at a faster pace.

For SingTel, which is expanding its mobile ad presence, Amobee will certainly be a big help. SingTel also announced a new organizational structure that reflects consumer segments. The three new units will be ‘Group Consumer,’ ‘Group Digital Life,’ and ‘Group ICT.’ It will take effect on April 1st.

SingTel has over 434 million mobile customers in over 25 countries.

Komli Media has acquired Admax Network, a leading digital media network in Southeast Asia for an undisclosed fee. Komli Media claims to have 120 million unique monthly users while Admax has 90 million.

The combined total will give Komli Media a whopping total of 150 million. A representative from Komli Media Group explained to me that its 120 million figure is a combination of third party audited numbers from comScore, Nielsen, and Effective Measure. The combined figure of 150 million monthly users is derived after the acquisition of Admax and discounting “duplicate users.”

With Admax on board, Komli Media hopes to strengthen its digital media foothold in Southeast Asia, boasting a network of 4,600 publishers, 350 advertisers (including Sony and Citibank), and exclusive sales partnerships with Facebook in Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines. It also has a partnership with MSN in Thailand.

The Admax team will integrate under the Komli Media brand along side Komli’s SEA team, operating as Aktiv Digital [1].

Based in Mumbai, India, Komli Media’s list of investors includes Norwest Venture Partners, Draper Nexus Ventures, Helion Ventures, and Draper Fisher Jurvetson. The company is in the mood to acquire other digital media network companies, as the a rep explained to me:

Komli looks at acquisitions only when they add strategic value to the company either by way of technology or distribution. Considering we have successfully acquired five companies in the last 2 years, the possibility cannot be ruled out if the right opportunity arises.

Here’s an official video made by Komli about the acquisiton (or video link for mobile readers):

Back in December we told you about Japan-based Metaps Inc., a smartphone monetization platform, which at that time had raised $4.2 million from various venture capital firms. And now today we received word that the company has secured another $1.3 million in financing. That brings its total to $5.5 million for its series A financing round.

The company says the funds will be used in further staffing its Singapore subsidiary, and to help expand Metaps market share abroad, particularly in Asia. In the next six months the company says offices will be established in China, the US, and Europe so that it can better connect with app developers and partners in those regions.

The last time we spoke to a Metaps representative about the company’s progress we were informed that it had over 1000 advertisers publishing ads, and over 100 participating developers. When we asked for an update today we didn’t get exact updated figures, but the company informs us that it is seeing a 30 percent increase in both advertisers and developers each month — and that’s certainly promising.

An example of the Madhouse 'Smartmad' animated ads that are used in China.

Madhouse, the largest mobile ad network in China, is making its way to India in the hope of succeeding in that populous, mobile-loving nation as well. Earlier today, the company announced the founding of Madhouse India and its plan to set up offices across three cities – though it wasn’t specified where those would be.

Madhouse was founded in 2006 and has its HQ in Shanghai. In its initial incarnation in China, it has worked with the likes of Rovio (makers of the Angry Birds games), China Unicom’s (NYSE:CHU; HKG:0762) app store, and has put ads into Freemium EA (NASDAQ:ERTS) mobile games. Rovio, and some of its other existing partners and clients, will stick with Madhouse in its new venture in India, which’ll give the company a running start from day one.

The newly-appointed COO for Madhouse India is Vinod Thadani who said in a press release that the company is “determined to change the face of the Indian digital media landscape and grow the mobile media market from 125 to 1,000 crores within the next 3 years.” That’s an aim to expand the industry to be worth US$203 million by 2015.

The last time we took an overview of India, we saw that it has over 850 million mobile subscribers, and that 59 percent of all web users there only ever access the web on phones. That’s the kind of audience that the new Madhouse India is reaching out to.

We’re always on the lookout for creative online marketing campaigns from companies here in Asia. But we were somewhat surprised to hear that Air China (HKG:0753) was using Facebook as a promotional tool since the popular social network is blocked in China. But upon taking a closer look, this particular campaign was for Air China in Sweden, where of course Facebook is not blocked at all.

The campaign was orchestrated by Swedish ad agency Rodolfo, who decided to take advantage of local Asian restaurants in Stockholm. Customers were encouraged to check-in [1] at these restaurants for a chance to win plane tickets to Asia. Leaders were tracked on Air China’s Facebook page, and each week during the campaign a winner was awarded, 24 people in total over the course of the campaign. A Rodolfo representative tells us that this promo was a pretty efficient way of creating buzz around the Air China brand:

When presenting this [idea] to our client we emphasized the fact that we were actually getting free advertising space via the restaurants. So instead of buying lots of media, we wanted to create it. And so we did. . . We naturally chose facebook because it’s very popular here in Sweden.

You can check out a video overview of the campaign below, which claims that over 15,000 users were ‘engaged’ during the promotion, and over 1.2 million people were ‘reached.’

It’s really impressive to see Air China take advantage of Facebook in this manner. It would be nice if companies could use it domestically, but with Facebook blocked, that’s not likely to happen anytime soon.

Photo: Air China on Facebook

Being a social media strategist here in Singapore, I recently found myself doing some research into which were the top Facebook Pages in in this country. After a little bit of digging, I’ve come up with the top 10 which are listed on the right [1]. And yes, there are more than a few surprises here.

What can we learn by looking at Singapore’s best Facebook pages? How have they managed to capture so many fans? How have they managed to grow such active communities with high participatory rates? Here are some of my own thoughts on what most of these pages have in common.

1. Quality of Fans > Quantity of Fans

While the numbers here are all impressive, these findings demonstrate one fact: that these top brands value the quality of fans far greater than the absolute number of fans they have acquired.

The Singapore Police Force Facebook Page is an excellent example of this. What is surprising about this being the top Facebook Page in Singapore is that there is little/no way they could be offering promotional content, discounts, or deals to bargain-hungry Singaporeans to encourage participation. Instead they have focused strongly on adding value to the community – even providing links to external organizations, such as the Health Sciences Authority, to answer questions from the general public.

Engagement rates on the Singapore Police Force Facebook Page are particularly high, with a very healthy amount of comments, likes, and shares. In fact, members of the community on the Singapore Police Force Facebook Page have taken it upon themselves to even address queries by the general public, thus compounding the page’s value. All in all, this illustrates a number of good qualities: brand advocacy, adding value to the community, and allowing fans to have a positive stake in the brand.

2. Fans prefer content which adds value. Don’t be overly promotional!

Content which adds value is a practice which BlackBerry Singapore, the 2nd most popular Facebook Page in Singapore, advocates as well. For the past month in December 2011, it had only ONE active piece of promotional content about its smartphones. The rest of the content has been about quality content which BlackBerry Users in general will find useful. We’re talking about applications (adding value to even the developer community!), quick tips, and even videos from BlackBerry users on how the device has impacted their lives. The result? Active and positive engagement, multiple shares, and content which is relevant and matters to the community at large.

3. The Type of Content Matters

There’s a saying that “if content is king, conversation is queen.” How can brands in Singapore ensure a good balance of both content and conversation? The type of content does matter. All the top 10 Facebook pages in Singapore vary their content, and are more pre-disposed to posting photos and videos than just generic Status Updates. This is an important tip which brands in general – and I’m not talking just about brands in Singapore alone – need to remember.

This corroborates with Facebook’s Edgerank formula helps determine the top content that will appear at the top of your Facebook News Feed when you log into Facebook.

The News Feed is the first page that users will see upon logging into Facebook. So it is important to optimize the objects (status updates, photos, videos, links) which users will find more relevant to their interests, and encourage greater engagement.

Generally speaking, Facebook prefers interactive content. This means that photos and videos will have a higher propensity to be at the top of the news feed of fans compared to links and status updates. In fact, the equation is as follows: Photos & Videos > Links > Status Updates.

ALL of the top 10 Facebook pages in Singapore exhibit this varied content strategy, especially interactive media such as photos and videos. And generally, this is the content which attracts the most shares.

Timing and consistency matters as well. And you certainly can’t be lazy if you want to win big in the Facebook game. Every top 10 Facebook page in Singapore posts different content every day – some even at multiple times in one day.

4. Wait a minute. What about fan postings?

You may notice that BlackBerry Singapore, Charles & Keith, and Singapore Airlines don’t allow for fan postings. Why are they still so successful? When deciding whether or not to allow fan postings, I think it varies from brand to brand. Generally, such a practice isn’t encouraged as it could alienate your community. More importantly, set your expectations with the community right from the start. Will it be for news updates? Hot Deals? Customer Service?

If you’d like to read more facts and figures about Facebook in Singapore check out this slideshow that I’ve put together below.

Having only just formed this past summer, Japan-based Metaps Inc. is a reward advertisement network that allows smartphone developers to create ads that reward users based on actions like installs or registrations. And today it is announcing that the company has raised $4.2 million from a number of venture capital firms.

According to the announcement, the funding will be used to help expand its business around Asia, particular its new Singapore-based subsidiary, Metaps Pte. Ltd.

A Metaps representative tells me that the company has over 1000 advertisers publishing ads, and over 100 participating developers. The network enables advertising in 25 countries, and has ambitions to become the largest reward advertising network in the Asia region by the end of next year.

Metaps is focusing on Android for now, saying that it represents more potential for growth, but it does support iOS via a web based UI. I’m told that the company already has formed partnerships with a number of overseas ad networks, including Leadbolt — who coincidentally partnered with another Japanese mobile ad company, Mediba, just this week.

Adways Indonesia – a subsidiary of the Japanese advertising company Adways – is expanding its reach to social mobile games. The latest game, World of Monster (pictured above), is available now on Android, after launching earlier in some countries on iOS. Indonesian gamers won’t see the official localization of the game launch until April 2012 on iOS though. In Japanese, it’s dubbed Kaibutsu Chronicle (where ‘Kaibutsu’ means ‘monster’).

World of Monster is a social RPG game and it has already launched in Japan (iOS and Android), China (iOS only), and Taiwan (also just on iOS). The number of daily active users in Japan is up to 50,000, while the total number of users has reached 759,000, keeping World of Monster always in the top five apps in the Japanese iTunes AppStore for the last five months. Talking directly with Hayato Takano, the president of Adways Indonesia, he also mentioned that the revenue per day in Japan for this game is 2,000,000 yen ($25,726) on average. Adways – which opened its office in Indonesia in September – is planning to introduce this game to every Southeast Asia market one after another.

While the levels of traction and revenue in Japan are decent, Adways Indonesia doesn’t expect the money to be coming in from gaming just yet. The first goal, Hayato explains, is to get one million users as soon as possible, at least before the end of next year. When asked about the payment methods available for in-app purchases within the free app, he says that Adways Indonesia is planning to utilize a lot of e-payment systems – for example Paypal, or Google Checkout – and hoping to strike a deal for a telco payment system in some countries too.

Ads and Analytics Too

Adways Indonesia itself is a digital media consultancy specializing in targeted online marketing for companies in Indonesia, as the office’s profile page details. So far, its clients have included Japanese multinational companies – and that has helped to build the subsidiary’s Facebook profile and fan page. Adways expanded to Singapore on December 2nd, with the name Adways Innovations Singapore. Not only that, the Japanese ad platform company is planning to introduce an advertising system for Android and iOS called App Driver (pictured above). Hayato said that it won’t just work for their games but also for any other app and developer to use in order to monetize their mobile apps and analyze their usage. It sounds like the Chinese Umeng ad platform that my PO colleague reviewed recently.

While GREE (TYO:3632) and DeNA (TYO:2432) have been fighting it out in social games for quite a while, Adways has been among the first to make a move in the huge potential market of Indonesia (although GREE has been putting a special focus on Indonesia as well). The Indonesian mobile market is one of the biggest in the world, and so if Adways can get the payment system right – and easy – for users to purchase virtual items, then we can expect a decent turnover for Adways Indonesia in the next few years.

The free game is available in selected countries on both Android (version 2.1 and above) from the Android Market, and in the iTunes AppStore.

[UPDATE on 12/06 at 11pm BJ time: Qihoo has responded in a press release saying that Citron's latest report contains "numerous errors of fact" and has undercounted the paid-for ad links on its homepage by about a half. Read the Qihoo presser here].

Round 3! Fight! Here we go again, as the American short-sellers Citron Research unleashes its third attack on the Chinese anti-virus vendor Qihoo 360 (NYSE:QIHU). It’s part of an ongoing exposé by Citron into what it sees as a company that “has either not been forthright about its revenue model […] or there is a financial fraud unfolding.”

After criticisms of its previous two posts – including by PO – that Citron doesn’t understand China, Citron has this time focused solely on the math. It claims that Qihoo’s likely homepage advertising revenue – which is the greatest source of income, because the security software is largely free – is a mere US$5.5 to 8 million per quarter, which is far short of the $20.9 million that Citron has deduced it ought to be, on the basis of Qihoo’s own revenue analysis for Q3 2011 (pictured below):

Show Me the Ad Revenue!

Citron found this alleged major disparity by looking at the links on Qihoo’s directory homepage – hao.360.cn – and finding the ones that are tracked, and thereby likely paid-for. Of the hundreds of links on that much trafficked site, it reckons there are about “60 to 65 links with tracking IDs to the websites of third party entities,” which is about the right balance that can also apparently be found on Baidu’s (NASDAQ:BIDU) directory homepage, hao123.com.

From that tally of a supposed 65 paid-for links, and applying an average fee of 200,000 RMB ($31,000) per link per month, Qihoo’s homepage revenue comes out at just $6.1 million. Even allowing for some of those links being more valuable, Citron claims that the income from homepage ads could not possibly exceed $8 million.

Here’s a section of that homepage, photoshopped by Citron to illustrate that green links are probably paid-for, red ones are self-referring, and yellow ones are untracked and presumably free:

Follow the money: Citron presumes that only the links it has made green are paid-for. (Image source: Citron Research)

Remember AltaVista?

In addition to that, Citron claims that Qihoo is cheating on its online gaming revenue stats as well, which can be explored at the source link below.

Citron’s newest claims, however, end on a dubious point, saying that Qihoo is in a “terminal” and dying business – an assertion based on the failure of similar web directory services such as AltaVista, and Excite (remember them!?). Although, yes, those died out in America before the so-called web 2.0 kicked in, such sites might well still have legs in China, where new people come onto the internet at a rate of 10 million each month, and often turn to those awkward pagefuls of links from Baidu and Qihoo for guidance. Heck, if Baidu is doing it, it must still be worth doing. Making dodgy parallels is what undermined Citron’s initial exposé last month.

Despite earlier attacks calling Qihoo a “fraud,” its stocks have recovered from a couple of dips, and closed yesterday at $17.52. For Q4 2011, the company has issued guidance that it’ll be above analyst’s estimates and expects revenues to be between $55 million and 56 million.

[Source: Citron Research]

B2C e-commerce site Letao.com is cutting its advertising budget by 80 percent, says its CEO, Mr. Bi Sheng, as it burns through approximately half of the company’s expenses. That onerous overhead is one that apparently all smaller online retailing sites are suffering, as competition in this sector gets ever more fierce.

Beijing-based Letao started out specializing only in shoes, though it has since taken an adventurous turn into mobile gaming related merchandise on the ‘Applife’ section of its site, where it sells official clothes and shoes from gaming hits Angry Birds, Plants vs Zombies, Fruit Ninja, and Taiko Drum Master. Indeed, when we looked at Rovio’s Chinese-themed update for Angry Birds Seasons a few months ago, we also looked at how the Finnish game dev company had tapped Letao.com to be its official clothing distributors.

Speaking very frankly to Sina Tech news – indeed, much more candidly that most CEOs ever do – Bi Sheng said he often feels that the entire e-commerce sector in China is not sustainable as it stands at the moment. He added, “This July I felt that the entire market is not right,” and that gut reaction prompted him to slash 80 percent of Letao’s expenditure on advertising in a bid to reduce wastage. He revealed that his site was spending 350,000 RMB ($55,000) per month last year on Baidu’s ad platform, and that had doubled to 700k earlier this year. So, presumably after these cost-savings, Letao will spend just 140,000 RMB per month on those online ads. It’s not clear how much it is spending on other forms of critical advertising in this sector, such as outdoor ads in major cities.

Letao has plenty of competition too – from the major brand storefronts on Alibaba’s Tmall to upcoming specialist sites like OKBuy (which also focuses on shoes).

The Zappos-like Letao raised a huge 200 million RMB (US$31.4m) in series-C funding at the start of this year – from the likes of Ceyuan Ventures, DT Capital Partners, and the Tiger Fund – and also stated at the time that it would not engage in a price war.

From Bi Sheng’s frank chat, there’s no suggestion that Letao is having problems – just that the whole sector needs to cool down on the cut-throat ad spending and think of other ways to innovate and draw in customers. But with B2C competitors like Dangdang (NYSE:DANG) and 360Buy always at each other’s throats, and the big hitters Alibaba and Tencent (HKG:0700) edging closer in battle, that’s not too likely to happen.

[Source: Sina Tech news - article in Chinese]

Madhouse, the largest mobile ad network in China, has teamed up with Electronic Arts (NASDAQ:ERTS) – aka EA – to put live ads into the freemium versions of EA games in China, such as Need for Speed SHIFT 2 Unleashed (pictured above).

When we heard EA’s Mike Pagano talking on a panel recently in Beijing, he pointed out how his local team has four gaming titles fully localized – and free – for the China market. These come with possible in-app purchases (pictured below); and now they’ll also have the ads powered by Madhouse’s SmartMad ad network.

An example of the Madhouse 'SmartMad' live ads.

The “live ads” will be literally and technically dynamic – sometimes animated and full-screen (pictured right; for another of its clients, KFC) so that they’re not confined to a banner, and always able to learn users’ preferences for certain kinds of ads.

After the usual press release pleasantries, Madhouse’s COO, Dan Wong, said:

Our collaboration makes it possible for EA Mobile to reach an even broader segment of users by bringing down the end user cost.

By which he means: this kind of ad platform can make freemium a lot more lucrative for developers whilst also bringing down the cost for users. In China, with payment method issues on iOS, and, er… no paid app support at all on the Android Market, freemium is the (only?) way to go.

Rather confirming this, Jim Lee, the CEO of EA Mobile China, commented:

EA will invest heavily in developing the mobile games market in China, including the introduction of more and more free-to-play games powered by advertising.

Madhouse – along with its SmartMad platform – already has some big gaming names using its system in China, such as the localized versions of Rovio Mobile’s Angry Birds games.

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) released a new report earlier this week on smartphone usage in China’s urban areas.

According to this study, China has one of the world’s highest levels of smartphone penetration – of the 97 percent of Chinese urban residents who own mobile phones, 35 percent use smartphones. The market opportunity for Chinese mobile advertising is clearly tremendous.

There are three main behavior traits behind this trend:

1. Chinese urbanites use smartphones all-day long… almost

Chinese smartphone users are on their phones everywhere, nearly all the time. 53 percent of Chinese smartphone users say that they plan to spend even more time using their phones in the future. China ranks third in the category of everyday smartphone usage in Google’s global study.

2. High awareness of mobile advertising

According to Google’s study, 50 percent of Chinese smartphone users notice mobile ads. After noticing a mobile ad:

• 39 percent click on the ad itself
• 39 percent search for additional information about the product on their computer
• 32 percent visit the company’s mobile website
• 32 percent make a purchase

3. Purchase-driven smartphone search

64 percent of Chinese smartphone users conduct online searches every week. The chart below shows their main purpose for searching online. We can see mobile search helps to heavily influence purchasing decisions.

What to advertise and where?

Let’s break down these two key questions:

What do Chinese smartphone users buy via smartphones?

According to Google’s research, popular purchase categories include movie tickets, entertainment, travel, clothing, groceries, home items, cosmetics, and electronic products. It includes almost all the categories of daily life purchases.

Where to display ads?

As mentioned below, half of smartphone users notice mobile ads. They mainly notice mobile ads while on search engines, video sites, using applications and on retail sites (see graph below).

2 tips for advertisers:

• Instead of considering mobile ads and other online ads separately, advertisers should develop a comprehensive cross-channel marketing strategy which incorporates mobile ads as one part of an overall strategy. In order to achieve the best marketing results, advertisers should be aware of the ties between mobile ads and other online ads.
• Advertisers should consider the compatibility of their advertisements with users’ smartphones. Among China’s smartphone users today, 40 percent use the Symbian system, 20 percent use the Android platform, and 10 percent use Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iOS. Therefore, from high-end phones such as the iPhone, to Android phones, to WAP-oriented feature phones, make sure that the advertisement can display properly for targeted users.

Conclusion

Smartphones in China have already become indispensable lifestyle and shopping tools for Chinese consumers. They are continuing to grow in importance as they are often used throughout the research and decision-making process of user purchasing. Marketers should seek to make it easy for Chinese customers to find their company via mobile search in order to influence their purchase decisions and heighten their brand awareness.

That’s especially true for those advertisers and brands who may have lost the opportunity to win over the China market through traditional advertising media. And so mobile advertising might be the ideal new marketing channel for re-shaping brand preference and quickly occupying a greater share of the market in China.