The age of big data is playing out in lots of ways. One of the opportune areas it’s colliding with is call monetization. Call analytics providers like Marchex are planting this flag with analytics to derive meaning — and thus ROI — from inbound phone leads.

Following a recent video post from our call analytics session at the Interactive Local Media Conference in San Francisco, below is part two. It drills down into best practices in call analytics — told by Marchex, with examples from its product set.

We’ll follow up soon with video clips from the rest of the session. Meanwhile, we’re gearing up for BIA/Kelsey NATIONAL, where we’ll cover this topic as well. The conference takes place two weeks in Dallas. Hope to see you there.*

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*email me for discount code to attend: mbolandATbiakelsey.com

The post Conference Video: Call Monetization is All About Analytics appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Following yesterday’s video post on Deseret Digital Media’s (DDM) stance on separating new media from old, it’s time now to drill down on the “how.” (video below)

As a brief recap, media companies that launch digital products under entirely new divisions can benefit from nimbleness and growth that isn’t saddled with an innovator’s dilemma. As discussed yesterday, this church & state separation happens on many levels, such as sales and product development.

For the latter, Deseret has developed products that natively make sense for mobile, rather than shoving desktop formats on a smaller screen. As we’ve seen, desktop ad formats don’t monetize as well in mobile, which has been the biggest reason I’ve observed for publisher and advertiser reticence with mobile.

So the answer — as we’ve espoused in the past — is to work with entirely new formats that not only make sense for mobile’s unique form factor, but actually utilize it’s unique variables to create higher performing ads. Those performance deltas lead to premiums, thus counteracting the monetization dilemma.

Those formats and strategies can involve things such as location targeting and calls to action to capture high-intent mobile actions (like calling a business). But as DDM’s Christopher Lee demonstrates in clear economic terms, it’s also about abandoning traditional formats — like display — altogether.

He names lots of examples of what DDM calls “mobile ready” revenue, then zeros in on native advertising such as sponsored articles. This has traditionally been snubbed in news and journalism contexts but makes more sense in the smartphone era, he argues. The 10 minute highlight reel is below.

The post Conference Video: DDM Part II: Finding "Mobile-Ready" Revenue appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Following yesterday’s video post on Deseret Digital Media’s (DDM) stance on separating new media from old, it’s time now to drill down on the “how.” (video below)

As a brief recap, media companies that launch digital products under entirely new divisions can benefit from nimbleness and growth that isn’t saddled with an innovator’s dilemma. As discussed yesterday, this church & state separation happens on many levels, such as sales and product development.

For the latter, Deseret has developed products that natively make sense for mobile, rather than shoving desktop formats on a smaller screen. As we’ve seen, desktop ad formats don’t monetize as well in mobile, which has been the biggest reason I’ve observed for publisher and advertiser reticence with mobile.

So the answer — as we’ve espoused in the past — is to work with entirely new formats that not only make sense for mobile’s unique form factor, but actually utilize it’s unique variables to create higher performing ads. Those performance deltas lead to premiums, thus counteracting the monetization dilemma.

Those formats and strategies can involve things such as location targeting and calls to action to capture high-intent mobile actions (like calling a business). But as DDM’s Christopher Lee demonstrates in clear economic terms, it’s also about abandoning traditional formats — like display — altogether.

He names lots of examples of what DDM calls “mobile ready” revenue, then zeros in on native advertising such as sponsored articles. This has traditionally been snubbed in news and journalism contexts but makes more sense in the smartphone era, he argues. The 10 minute highlight reel is below.

The post Conference Video: DDM Part II: Finding “Mobile-Ready” Revenue appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Like George Costanza, Deseret Digital Media (DDM) likes to separate its worlds. This is a longstanding debate among media companies about whether or not new digital products and divisions (and correspondingly, ad sales teams) should be independent of the legacy business.

Having these new products/divisions under the operational control of the main organization is what often happens, usually for reasons of control or inertia. But DDM CEO Clark Gilbert believes that this is a fatal mistake. He showed us why during the opening keynote at ILM ’14. (video below).

This furthers Gilbert’s message that has origins in research from his mentor Clayton Christensen. He shows how only 9 percent of companies facing industry disruption managed to grow revenue past the industry peak. Every one of those launched separate divisions to innovate new products (including DDM).

Advantages include allowing new divisions to have their own sandbox and avoid a classic innovator’s dilemma (speaking of Christensen). Digital products won’t hold a chance if they can’t have the independence and autonomous decision making to move at the speed of their pure-play competitors.

Interestingly, the concept of separating worlds transcends operational control. Sales teams selling advertising around digital products should also be separated according to Gilbert. The sales aspects of this debate are central to a BIA/Kelsey white paper that will publish tomorrow.

And the product execution itself — such as native advertising as DDM demonstrates — should likewise be separated in terms of the talent that’s producing it. For example, there should be a church & state division between journalists at a newspaper, and the writers of paid content marketing pieces.

See the 10-minute highlight reel below. This mostly covers the “why”. As for the “how,” the full session was choc full of examples of how DDM is pulling this off. We’ll be back tomorrow with Part II, covering its tactics around things like mobile monetization and native advertising.

The post Conference Video: The Eternal Question of Separating Digital Media Divisions appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

The call is the new click, as we keep saying. Phone calls to businesses have ratcheted up in the age of the smartphone — a device that bolts a search engine to a phone. We project this to grow to 72 billion calls by 2018. And it’s not just quantity but quality… these are high-intent consumer calls that convert well.

We examined these concepts and supporting data in a mega-session at our December ILM conference. The first of several videos is embedded below: the session’s introductory segment in which Abid Chaudhry and I set the stage for all of the speakers with a BIA/Kelsey data presentation.

This continues our call monetization coverage including white papers, blog posts and more conference sessions at future shows. It will be a quickly moving and opportune space to watch.

The post Conference Video: Call Monetization in the Smartphone Age appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Mobile payments won’t take over the universe in 2015, as the tech media would have you believe. But it will have a noticeable impact on our favorite new topic: On demand local services (ODLS), a la Uber.

That’s where mobile payments’ physical barriers (i.e. point of sale compatibility) don’t exist. Think of it like in-app payments but for local services fulfilled offline — everything from walking your dog to getting a ride somewhere.

Apple Pay could unleash this already quickly developing area by creating a single point of entry for payment authentication. That makes it easier than dealing with separate payment systems for several ODLS apps.

We tackled this topic in the opening analyst roundtable of our Interactive Local Media conference last month in San Francisco. The video is below for the mobile payments segment. The rest of the roundtable is coming soon.

The post Conference Roundtable: The State of Mobile Payments appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

On demand local services (ODLS) a la Uber will not only bring buyer and seller together with leaner unit economics, but could also transform the way local services are marketed and fulfilled. This was the theme of a session we held at last month’s ILM conference (video below).

In part two of the series, we interviewed four companies that represent how ODLS is expanding to nearly every local service vertical. This is emblematic of the attractiveness of its unit economics; shedding the overhead costs of traditional companies or service models.

“It’s empowering what we’ll call the 1099 ‘economy,’ Urgent.ly CEO Chris Spanos said. “UberX is probably the best example, but expect that revolution to occur across every vertical that you can imagine.”

For example, we’re even seeing it enter the legal vertical. Leigh McMillan of Avvo characterized a swath of legal needs that can be fulfilled in a lower barrier fashion than we’ve traditionally seen in the process of procuring legal services. Avvo Advisor is filling that need.

MyNeighbor’s Brendan Benzing meanwhile attributes the rise of ODLS to generational factors. As we heard from Spanos in Part I, millennials don’t want to own things… it’s antithetical to the blatant consumerism of their forbears (ODLS could also employ an entire generation).

“They’re apprehensive about owndership, and they see access as a more experiential way of consumption,” said Benzing. “But there are also similarities to baby boomers who are towards the end of lives and are no longer gathering things. They’re trying to unload and de-clutter.”

Curbside’s Joel Toledano is also applying the principles of ODLS to a new vertical: Retail. The model is to save consumers time (an oft-forgotten reward) by letting them order items via mobile to be picked up outside of a retail location. It’s a new spin on “O2O” commerce.

In addition to the demand aggregation that’s characteristic of ODLS, Curbside combines the ease of e-commerce with the immediacy of offline shopping, but without the parking and typical retail schlep. Moreover, we’re seeing ODLS meta-moments, as they happen on top of each other.

“We’ve launched at two City Targets,” said Toledano to set the stage for an ODLS one-two punch, “where people will drive up in an Uber, step out grab [their purchased item], get right back in the car and keep going.”

The full session video is embedded below, preceded by chapter links for those that want to view it in smaller chunks. Stay tuned for a longer BIA/Kelsey insight paper on this topic, as well as a few upcoming announcements.

Video Chapter Links

Defining ODLS and its drivers
Pricing models
Generational factors and “Post Consumerism”
ODLS and retail
ODLS and legal services
Types of products best fit for ODLS
What does the ODLS future look like?

The post Conference Video: Transforming the ‘1099 Economy,’ Part II appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

On demand local services (ODLS) a la Uber will not only bring buyer and seller together with leaner unit economics, but could also transform the way local services are marketed and fulfilled. This was the theme of a session we held at last month’s ILM conference (video below).

In part two of the series, we interviewed four companies that represent how ODLS is expanding to nearly every local service vertical. This is emblematic of the attractiveness of its unit economics; shedding the overhead costs of traditional companies or service models.

“It’s empowering what we’ll call the 1099 ‘economy,’ Urgent.ly CEO Chris Spanos said. “UberX is probably the best example, but expect that revolution to occur across every vertical that you can imagine.”

For example, we’re even seeing it enter the legal vertical. Leigh McMillan of Avvo characterized a swath of legal needs that can be fulfilled in a lower barrier fashion than we’ve traditionally seen in the process of procuring legal services. Avvo Advisor is filling that need.

MyNeighbor’s Brendan Benzing meanwhile attributes the rise of ODLS to generational factors. As we heard from Spanos in Part I, millennials don’t want to own things… it’s antithetical to the blatant consumerism of their forbears (ODLS could also employ an entire generation).

“They’re apprehensive about owndership, and they see access as a more experiential way of consumption,” said Benzing. “But there are also similarities to baby boomers who are towards the end of lives and are no longer gathering things. They’re trying to unload and de-clutter.”

Curbside’s Joel Toledano is also applying the principles of ODLS to a new vertical: Retail. The model is to save consumers time (an oft-forgotten reward) by letting them order items via mobile to be picked up outside of a retail location. It’s a new spin on “O2O” commerce.

In addition to the demand aggregation that’s characteristic of ODLS, Curbside combines the ease of e-commerce with the immediacy of offline shopping, but without the parking and typical retail schlep. Moreover, we’re seeing ODLS meta-moments, as they happen on top of each other.

“We’ve launched at two City Targets,” said Toledano to set the stage for an ODLS one-two punch, “where people will drive up in an Uber, step out grab [their purchased item], get right back in the car and keep going.”

The full session video is embedded below, preceded by chapter links for those that want to view it in smaller chunks. Stay tuned for a longer BIA/Kelsey insight paper on this topic, as well as a few upcoming announcements.

Video Chapter Links

Defining ODLS and its drivers
Pricing models
Generational factors and “Post Consumerism”
ODLS and retail
ODLS and legal services
Types of products best fit for ODLS
What does the ODLS future look like?

The post Conference Video: Transforming the '1099 Economy,' Part II appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Surviving the shift from tradition to digital revenue may not be the most challenging transformation for media companies. Speaking at BIA/Kelsey’s recent Leading in Local: Interactive Local Media conference,Christopher Lee, president of Deseret Digital Media, offered a primer on staying ahead of revenue’s transition from traditional to digital to “mobile ready.”

One of the key’s to making this shift is developing a strong native advertising capability, and Deseret is an early leader among media companies in mastering the art and science of native.

Lee says Desert Digital Media has two digital revenue buckets. The first is display (which he describes as “90 percent at risk”) and the second is “mobile ready,” which is growing by about 30 percent annually, according to Lee. Assessing the mobile-readiness of revenue is a critical test of a media business’s sustainability.

While CPMs are currently low, through skilled targeting, CPMs can grow over time. So what defines mobile-ready revenue? Here is Lee’s list:

Deseret has been particularly innovative in native advertising, building its own internal capability and developing an evolving set of KPIs and best practices. Lee says native packs a much bigger punch than more tradition forms of online advertising like banners.

The average native article on Deseret’s online properties generates 13,424 views, only slightly below the 13,836 that editorial articles receive. Lee estimated it would costs $39,000 to get 13,000 brand engagements with a brand using banner ads.  With native, Lee said advertisers for “much lower cost get the same result.” Deseret sells native in packages that include content creation and posting, with clients free to use the content on their own properties as well. In some cases Deseret will distribute the native content via social media and email marketing, for additional fees.

However, Lee did acknowledge that native is not a fit for all advertisers, particularly not very small ones.

He also captured a primer on how to develop an effective native advertising capability on the following slide:

The post At ILM 2014: Is Your Revenue Mobile Ready? appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.

Apple Pay won’t have the near term transformative effect on proximity payments that everyone seems to think.  It will get there eventually, as “chicken & egg” hardware compatibility issues work themselves out in 2015. In the meantime, in-app payments will be where Apple Pay shines.

As opposed to in-app payments for virtual goods like app upgrades, songs, ringtones, etc., I’m referring to in-app payments for services that are fulfilled offline. This is the emerging on demand local services (ODLS) space popularized by Uber and taking over several local verticals.

We held a session at ILM ’14 last week on ODLS that was a highlight of the show. We’ve also written extensively about it. Lastly, I gave a presentation to kick off the show which, summarized our view of payments and ODLS. A replica of that presentation’s slides and voiceover can be seen below.

The post BIA/Kelsey Presentation: 10 Minutes on Mobile Payments appeared first on BIA/Kelsey - Local Media Watch.