Telemedia Month MARCH by annika micheli

Issue 38 • MAR 2013

Operator content sales tank, but direct billing could net $13bn a year revenues from mobile content, monetised through direct carrier billing, is expected to rise from $2bn last year to more than $13bn by 2017, according to a new report from Juniper Research. The report observed that operator storefronts and portals now accounted for just 6% of content downloads worldwide, with Google Play and Apple’s App Store now comprising nearly 70% between them. Indeed, the report noted that the increasing popularity of OTT (Over The Top) stores had led to many operators closing their own storefronts. However, the report - Mobile Content Business Models: OTT & Operator Strategy & Forecasts 2013-2017 - found that by offering carrier billing to third-party storefronts, operators could more than offset the continued decline in portal revenues. According to the report, storefronts which have already integrated carrier billing solutions have seen a 5-6x increase in conversion rates compared with credit card billing, together with an uplift in average transaction values. Furthermore, it observed that the implementation of carrier billing allowed storefronts and developers to monetise unbanked/ underbanked regions and demographics for the first time. As report author Dr Windsor Holden pointed out, “While many operators have now abandoned the own-brand storefront approach, by leveraging their billing relationship with the end user they can retain a foothold in the content play. Simply by offering consumers a billing choice, monetisation rates will rise dramatically.” There is another factor that might play into the hands of operators too. Research by one-click payment provider Flexion Mobile suggests that Google Play is underperforming for developers, resulting in dramatically lower revenues. Whilst Android is generally considered to be weaker in terms of monetisation than other smartphone platforms, Flexion recently conducted some research to find out how bad it is. The study found that mobile operator billing is on average ten times more effective in terms of conversion than Google Play billing. In Flexion’s study, Google Play’s in-app billing offered at best around 1% conversion from free trial to purchase. In other Android stores that use operator billing the conversion rate can be up to 10% after free trial. This means that consumers could generate up to ten times more revenue for Android apps in Google Play if offered a different billing method. “Our research findings should act as a wake-up call for Google and developers,” said Jens Lauritzson, CEO of Flexion Mobile. “Android is the world’s fastest growing mobile OS and Google Play is the biggest app store and home to thousands of developers. We believe it is Google’s obligation to offer good monetisation tools and it is pretty clear that by mandating the use of a billing SDK that does not convert well, it puts the whole ecosystem in danger.”

THIS MONTH... News

The latest news from the industry, along with analysis of what that news means, including: • 4G could net retailers £1.8bn extra revenues, says eBay 3 • Not signing up to Weve akin to not signing Beatles, warns Voda 4 • Orca and Powwownow use VSCs to revamp conferencing 5 • York City pro launches social mobile betting service 6 • Big Data for telecoms – learn all about it in Dubai 6 • mBlox sells PSMS biz to OpenMarket 7 • LFC rolls out wifi at Anfield to offer better fan services 7

Analysis Editorial Life begins at 40 Mobile is 40 years old, but 4G holds the key to how it becomes truly omnipotent and we all starting thinking digitally 9 PAYMENTS Happy Customers In the first of his regular columns, Rory Maguire explians how customer service is key to good m-payments 10 DATA Brave New World Paul Skeldon explains how data is the new digital currency – and how you start collecting it safely 11 mGaming & msports special Ahead of the mGaming & mSports Summits in London on 24 April, we take a special look at: mGambling 12 Social mobile gambling 14 Mobile sports 15 mGaming & mSports Summit Preview 18

Directory

The leading industry directory of services 17

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Latest news at www.telemedia-news.com Catch our blog at www.telemedia360.blogspot.com

DONT MISS! The mSport Summit

Join iGaming Business and Telemedia 360 for the only event dedicated to mobile gambling. With two conference tracks over one day, numerous networking opportunities and an exhibition floor to enjoy this is an event not to be missed if you are serious about the mobile gambling market. Expect to hear from and meet the leading players from the worlds of mobile and iGaming, and take the time to enjoy the mGaming Awards and an exclusive networking party.

DON’T MISS The mGaming Awards

April 24th, 2013 The Brewery, Chiswell Street London, EC1Y 4SD

WWW.MGAMINGSUMMIT.CO.UK

NEWS #RETAIL 4G offers £1.8bn boost to UK retailing, says eBay, but shops must act now the arrival of universal 4G in Britain could boost the retail economy by around £1.8 billion over a year, according to new research revealed today by eBay. The boost represents a 113% year on year uplift in mobile shopping, compared to 2012. This huge opportunity is being driven by changing consumer behaviour, with more than half (55%) of consumers using their devices more for shopping now than this time last year. Just under a third of all UK adults now use a smartphone for some aspect of their shopping journey – be it browsing, finding inspiration, price checking or buying; while around one in ten use a smartphone for making purchases. The study, compiled by retail analysts Conlumino, reveals that the major frustrations for UK mobile shoppers are speed (50.3%) and reliability (49.6%). The arrival of universal 4G will help to break down barriers and increase consumers’ likelihood to shop via their smartphones or tablets. With the industry at a crossroads, eBay is calling on retailers to get their businesses 4G-ready. Olivier Ropars, Senior Director of m-commerce, eBay Europe, explains: “Consumers today want convenience and speed. The arrival of universal 4G will bring with it a more immersive, instant and intimate shopping experience than ever before – putting the most exciting features of

mobile retail as we know it into high definition. It won’t just turbo-charge the way we shop, it will truly give us the ability to shop anytime, anywhere. That means an extra £1.8 billion of consumer spending up for grabs. Retailers must act now and think about the virtual shop window, to turn this huge opportunity into an exciting reality.” Neil Saunders, Director at Conlumino, adds: “Retailers today must take every chance to engage consumers, inspiring them and giving them every possible opportunity to buy and interact with their brands. An omnichannel approach is key to making this happen and with universal 4G on the horizon, retailers can’t afford to stand still.” But it is not as simple as just getting 4G networks up and running, warn network operators. While the study explains that the faster service is expected to reduce barriers to mobile shopping caused by

slow or unreliable internet access which can put off consumers from making purchases on smartphones, the gorvenment is also being nudged to get involved “The universal arrival of 4G will be the catalyst for making Britain truly digital,” says Feilim Mackle, Sales and Service Director, O2. “The greatest financial gains for businesses and the economy will be through the introduction of new digital products and services, whether they be services to make shopping easier or products that facilitate new ways of working. But to realise the true value of universal 4G, and the benefits it can bring to economic growth, both Government and business need to work together to drive the innovation needed to propel Britain forward.”

>>>from page 1 MNO content tanks, but direct billing wins out The results were consistent with Flexion’s findings from other stores where operator billing is used, which suggests that it is not Android the platform itself which is underperforming, but rather the monetization mechanisms mandated by Google Play. Flexion’s research has shown that developers could make substantially more revenues if Google Play offered better coverage of operator billing. Nokia, Microsoft, RIM, Samsung and even Facebook are all seeing the benefit of operator billing but Google does not seem to be in a rush to implement it.

“It would be fairly easy for Google to acquire a global operator billing business, but their approach seems to be that if operators want the business they should integrate with Google. That will take a while and by then developers may have given up on premium altogether, and advertising may be the dominating model. As the biggest online advertising network, the question is whether that would be such a bad thing for Google,” Lauritzson added. There are over 800,000 applications in Google Play, which makes it the biggest app store in terms of number of apps. Google has made it mandatory for

developers to use Google Play billing but there are no restrictions on which advertising networks can be used. This means that developers rely on either Google Play billing or advertising to generate revenues. In such a crowded store environment, however, it is clear that if developers don’t get featured or supported by advertising, their apps will not hit the charts. In addition price competition has also contributed to generally low pricing. For most developers, this means that it is almost impossible to make money from their apps in Google Play.

NEWS

#MARKETING Voda UK CEO urges brands to sign up to Weve to outwit Google, Facebook dominance vodafone UK CEO Guy Laurence has likened retailers and brands not signing up to UK operator marketing and m-payment JV Weve to “not signing the Beatles” as the operators go hell for leather to get retailers and brands to take the strategy seriously in a mobile marketing world increasingly dominated by Google and Facebook. Sprint and Telefonica have created a similar entity in the Americas as operators struggle to regain some control over the mobile marketing, retailing and payment spaces. Laurence said a lot of people laughed when the wireless industry said it would take over the camera industry in 2003. “It will happen in the mobile advertising space,” he said at an Ad Week Europe event, according to Travolution. “If you want to be the CMO who did not sign the Beatles, ignore

everything you have heard today.” Telefónica’s O2 UK CEO Ronan Dunne and EE chief Olaf Swantee also were on hand during the event to promote the initiative, saying that by combining efforts, the operators have what it takes in a world dominated so much by Google and Facebook. “We will bring to the table something Google do not have: an authenticated real relationship with the user that they trust,” Dunne said, according to Travolution. “Yes, we see the Googles of this world and others as potential competitors but we will bring what people really value. If we do that, the competition will take care of itself.” Weve – said to stand for We’ve Enabled Vital Experiences [catchy, eh? – Ed] – was launched last autumn and is composed of Vodafone, EE and O2 UK. The joint venture is expected to

launch mobile wallet services later this year and talks reportedly are underway with other operators to join the venture. Weve, has access to the combined 65 million customer records of the three operators, plans to use these existing customer relationships to offer services developed internally, as well opening access to third-party advertising, promotions and offers. Customers, who need to opt-in to receive Weve services, will potentially see their preferences, contact lists, browsing history and location being used to ensure targeting is appropriate. The move is reminiscent of how operators tried – and failed – to corner the mobile content market with operator portals et al back in the early 2000s.

NEWS

#MESSAGING Powwownow and Orca Digital launch industry changing mobile short code powwownow, the UK’s leading provider of free teleconferencing and Orca Digital, the UK’s leading provider of voice short codes, have officially launched a new short code for mobile. For the first time, mobile users are able to benefit from a fixed rate charge of 12.5p per minute for conference calling with Powwownow, regardless of the mobile network operator that they are with. Powwownow is the first free conference calling company to use mobile short codes, allowing users to benefit from a fixed, cheaper and transparent conference call rate whilst on the move. Users of all mobile networks are able to benefit from dialling the new short code (87373), instead of the usual 0844 number, whilst in the UK. Mobile short codes are not new. However, before Orca Digital, these were traditionally fixed at a high rate of around £2 per minute. Orca Digital is the first company to petition

the networks to bring these rates down, going a long way to remove the ‘penalty’ that consumers often pay for using a mobile instead of a landline. With the popularity of remote working on the rise, the introduction of this mobile short code to the free conference call service goes a long way to help make staying connected whilst out of the office affordable. “More than ever in today’s economic climate, it is essential that we provide consumers with the cheapest and fairest rates available,” commented Simon Curry, CEO of Powwownwow. “Although maintaining a free service for our part, mobile users have always suffered the penalty of higher call charges due to the costs imposed by mobile operators. Impressed with what Orca Digital has brought to other industries through their aggregation of the mobile networks, we are excited to be

working together to provide our customers with the cheapest and most transparent rates available. “Our collaboration with Orca Digital is unique within the industry. A natural addition to our free conference calling service, for the first time mobile users now also have access to a fixed line rate. Rushing back to the office landline to avoid high call charges can at last be a thing of the past.”

NEWS

#GAMING York City pro launches world’s first ‘social bet-work’ to harness the power of mobile

professional footballer Dave McGurk, a defender with York City, is hoping to score with his latest business venture, a unique new ‘social bet-work’, which will take on the bookies and change the way sports fans bet on their favourite teams. Bets of Mates (www.betsofmates.com) enables friends to join for free and have

a flutter against each other in a fantasy football-style league setting. However, unlike a traditional bookmakers, there is always a winner. The concept behind the site is that for every stake, each participant receives 100 points which they can distribute on different bets, with a win, lose or draw prediction. The player with the highest score in the league ultimately wins the game. However, there is always a winner, even if the prediction was not exactly right, as well as cash dished out to runners up. Bets of Mates is also equipped with social network-style message boards and alerts, making for an engaging, competitive environment between friends. The site will initially focus on domestic football leagues, but will quickly expand to other sports including darts, cricket and rugby. Dave McGurk, says: “Like all good ideas, Bets of Mates was conceived over a few beers and the football on a Saturday afternoon. My business partners and I had

been talking for some time about how there was a need for a betting service that combined the banter and competitiveness of friends, along with a guaranteed prize fund - unlike an accumulator bet where one wrong result can mean no winnings. “Since launch we’ve had phenomenal interest with strong week-on-week signups. I see that this is down to Bets of Mates challenging the status quo when it comes to sports betting, and offering something refreshing and new.” McGurk, started his career with the Darlington youth organisation and broke into the first team during the 2001–02 season. He has always been passionate for the sport and had a vision to create a sociable betting environment and a place where individuals can take part without the involvement of bookmakers. Also behind the venture are McGurk’s friends and now business partners - John Hughes, and business development manager Adam Haywood.

#EVENTS GETTING TO GRIPS WITH BIG DATA IN THE TELECOMS SECTOR an expert speaker panel that includes presentations by: whether you are just getting started with Big Data or are already leveraging Big Data analytics to create new revenue streams, differentiation and competitive advantage, Tavess’Telecoms Big Data & Analytics Forum offers you the opportunity to further your understanding of Big Data, gain new insights and exchange ideas with fellow operators and industry experts. Find out what Big Data opportunities operators have identified, what strategies they are adopting and what it will take for you to leverage the power of Big Data to drive tangible business results from

Confirmed Speakers Include • John Lincoln, SVP Business Marketing, Etisalat • George Chua, Vice President, Customer Analytics, Celcom Axiata • Juan Jose de la Torre, Vice President Strategy & Corporate Development, Intigral • Ala’a Al Hourani, Director Business Intelligence & Customer Insight, Corporate Strategy & Marketing, Mobily • Bassem Youssef, Head of Pricing, Market Research and Business Intelligence, Mobinil • Adil Ayub, Marketing Pricing, Planning & Performance Expert, Omantel

• Ali Rebaie, Independent BI/Big Data Analyst, Rebaie Analytics Group • Carlos Pinto, Manager, Analysys Mason • Dr. Olly Downs, SVP Data Sciences, Globys • Mounir Ariss, Managing Partner, Peppers & Rogers. For the detailed agenda and any speaker updates, please visit the Forum website regularly. Join Big Data professionals in Dubai this May and discover how to generate sustainable value from your vast data assets. Reserve your place today by registering online here. Looking forward to meeting you and your colleagues in Dubai!

NEWS

#PRS mBlox sells PSMS in key markets to OpenMarket following months of rumours in the industry, messaging company mBlox is set to sell its PSMS business to OpenMarket in the UK, US, Ireland and Australia, but retains its offerings in France, Spain and Finland. “By divesting the Premium SMS business, mBlox can continue to increase investment in our core business of messaging and mobile engagement between enterprises and consumers,” said mBlox CEO Tom Cotney. “In the future, our Premium SMS customers’ needs will be better served by OpenMarket in this segment of the industry as we focus our resources in these countries more deeply in the business to consumer segment. The move also allows us to give our Carrier partners in these regions more proactive support, as we work with them to develop and deploy the next generation

of mobile engagement solutions.” Details of the transaction were not disclosed, however Premium SMS customers served by mBlox will be transitioned to OpenMarket’s network over a period of three to five weeks beginning as early as April 1, 2013. Cotney said no disruption in customer service is anticipated. “This is a positive move for the clients we are transitioning to the stewardship of OpenMarket for their PSMS delivery. OpenMarket provides services that we do not offer in this space today,” said Cotney. mBlox processed over 5.3 billion messages last year in the enterprise to mobile business. The company will continue to offer and improve its two way messaging services using both long numbers and shortcodes in all countries and as a consequence will maintain its existing direct connections and carrier contracts.

#SPORT Liverpool installs Wi-Fi to improve match day experience Liverpool FC has deployed Xirrus Wireless Arrays at Anfield, enabling fans to access and share digital content during games as never before. The first phase of the deployment covers the two-tier, 12,000-seat Centenary Stand and adjoining corporate facilities. The network will be available to Liverpool fans for the home game against West Ham on Sunday 7 April. By offering Wi-Fi to its fans, Liverpool is hoping to improve their overall match day experience and encourage them to share the excitement of the game with the global Liverpool fan base. It also opens up a new way for Liverpool to gain insight and feedback from its fan base which hasn’t been possible up to now. Andrew Robinson, Head of Digital Media and Technology at Liverpool Football Club, explains: “Running our own data network based on Xirrus technology means we can provide our fans with a dedicated, robust and high quality experience. The added reliability and performance of high capacity Wi-Fi over 3G connections will encourage our fans to use social networks like Twitter and Facebook to share their experiences with fans unable to make it to the game.” Robinson continues: “A massive driver for this new network is that we can gain

more insight into our fans than ever before. Sign-in will be via a one-time registration process using an email address and fans will be encouraged to tell us their likes and dislikes. The technology will allow us to find out what devices fans like to connect with the Club on so we can invest in digital platforms accordingly. We will also find out more about how fans use the stadium and its facilities so we can adapt these to better serve them. “The experience that we’ve created from day one is something we think fans will get very excited about. We’ll be providing inmatch stats, food and drink offers, access to online retail, in-play betting in partnership with Paddy Power and also the ability to engage with a global audience outside of the stadium through social media platforms.” Sean Larner, VP International at Xirrus, comments: “This is not only a highly prestigious deployment, it’s also technically demanding, and we’re naturally pleased that Liverpool FC has recognised that Xirrus is the best option on the market. Stadia such as Anfield require specialised high capacity wireless networks to ensure an acceptable user experience for a very large number of concurrent users and devices.”

DONâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;T MISS! The mGaming Summit 24th April

mSPORT SUMMIT

Mobile Strategies for Sport and Sporting Events Mobile is set to overtake desktop usage by 2014, are you engaging the mobile market? Learn how to integrate mobile into your strategy and avoid the pitfalls Understand: l How mobile is changing consumer behaviour l Second screen, NFC, mobile payments l How to leverage brand and sponsorship assets l How to Develop effective apps And more Engage your mobile audience, book your place today! Visit us online to order today: www.msportsummit.com Or call our team to book you place: +44 (0)207 954 3514

April 24th, 2013 The Brewery, Chiswell Street London, EC1Y 4SD

WWW.MSPORTSUMMIT.COM

OPINION

FROM THE EDITOR

Life begins at 40 40 years ago, Martin Cooper made the first mobile phone call. While things have changed since then, they haven’t changed enough. Yet. 40 years ago the first mobile phone call was made. From a brick sized lump of electronics and at great, great expense. (For those of you of a UK only bent, it was 28 years ago that the first UK mobile phone call was made by none other than Ernie Wise from St Kathrine’s Dock in London to Vodafone’s HQ, which was above a curry house in Newbury). My how things have changed in those 40 years (or 28, if you are counting from Little Ern’s efforts) – but not as rapidly as the inventor of the mobile phone himself had hoped. Sure, the devices are really quite different, but that’s just Moore’s law at play. What is truly startling – and Martin Cooper, the Motorola chappy who made that first mobile call in New York backs me up here – is that mobile networks still get clogged up. Cooper, while basking in the attention afforded by the anniversary, glumly admitted that he was disappointed that calls still get dropped, connections can be slow and not everything is connected via mobile to each other. But hopefully all that is about to change with the advent of 4G (not to mention more wifi and better use of 2 and 3G networks) over the summer. In fact, eBay believes that 4G will make a massive difference to mobile commerce, delivering a £1.8billion bounty to retailers alone if they act now to get their mobile houses in order. But mobile offers so much more. A recent US survey by Kount suggests that big and small brands are all embracing mobile commerce with the same alacrity and that games, gambling and digital content are set to be the big growers by 2014. This is born out by the degree of interest shown in the mGambling and mSports Summits we are running on 24 April at the Brewery in London (see page 18 for details). The gambling and sports sectors have embraced mobile and are ready to take it forward. In fact, everyone is embracing mobile and taking it forward, but one can’t help but feel that really we are just seeing more of the same only faster… what 4G really means is that a fundamental rethink needs to occur across all businesses. 4G will make the UK truly digital (hopefully, finally Mr Cooper) and it will on the face of it make getting online and doing things faster. But the real challenge is ‘thinking digital’. The real benefits of 4G are in how it changes processes, produces new products and services and caters for new ways of shopping, engaging and spending. Its all a far cry from Ernie Wise, a curry house and a brick, but 4G is likely to usher in the vision of a mobile world that Martin Cooper envisaged all those years ago. Of course, the arrival of the Facebook phone – possibly turning Facebook into a new breed of network operator with a billion customers – could really shake things up, but that’s something we’ll have to leave until next time….

Heaven sent

Good Lord how things have changed. When the previous Pope was elected in 2005, mobile was relatively in its infancy. Just eight years – and one Pope – later, the world greeted the new Pontif with their devices held aloft. Assuming the lastest one doesn’t duck out to marry his boyfriend, I wonder how his successor will be greeted? Answers on an Instagram please...

Editorial Editor Paul Skeldon paulskeldon@me.com | Sales & Marketing info@telemediamagazine.com | Production Director Annika Micheli annika@telemediamagazine.com | Publisher Jarvis Todd jarvis@telemediamagazine.com To subscribe, please go to www.telemedia-news.com What we’ve been listening to Song from under the floorboards – Magazine | What we’ve been amused by The weather | Who we’ve been following #Awkwardbandphotos | What we’ve been reading about the true role of mobile in commerce | April 2013 will bring... mGaming & mSports Summits 2013

OPINION

Rory Maguire

The importance of

CUSTOMER SERVICE

Customer service is now becoming a battleground to win customers – but is no longer about answering the phone with a sweet voice, now its about addressing the minute issues consumers may have. And m-payments is where the battle is heating up. In the first of his monthly columns for Telemedia-month, Rory Maguire explains customer service with mobile payments is becoming a hot topic. We all know that with any product that is sold to consumers there is, by necessity, an after sales requirement. How you supply that support, what to expect from consumers and where consumers go for support though is a new challenge. One of my clients, ImpulsePay, operates pure Payforit services. Payforit has championed the role of overt pricing, positive consumer consent to charge, clear routes to receiving the purchased goods and text receipts that tell you what you spent. Customer Service therefore should only be geared for an occasional call relating to dissatisfaction with the product purchased. This does not appear to be the case though, as pervasive amnesia or a desire to deny everything is gripping a small (12%) but vocal subset of consumers. The “deny everything” phenomenon is not new. Some time ago a mobile network user claimed vociferously that her phone had been cloned and the cloner was making late night calls to an expensive adult chat line. The calls stopped after she was advised to put a PIN lock on her phone and started again when she took the lock off again. However she denied that anyone in the house, including her teenage son could have made the calls. In another case, a mobile user had subscribed to a Payforit service but denied that he could ever have done so as he was in the cinema at the time. It transpired that he had used a Torch App to find his seat and in an attempt to switch the light off had hit an ad for a service (free apps tend to be funded by ads), which had displayed a page advising him of

the recurring charge and he had clicked “continue” and then the big green “Subscribe Now” button on the Payforit page. All this was done in attempting to turn off the light. When asked why he did not respond to the message that told him he was in a subscription service, he said he thought it was a scam and if he had sent STOP, he would confirm his number to the scammers. Urban myths rule over on-line support. These consumers took up considerable amount of diagnostic time but were helped through their “denial” stage. In the meantime however, they had blogged their complaints and unfortunately never went back to eat humble pie. Online complaints that are factually incorrect are at best, irritating and at worst, can destroy legitimate businesses. Other consumers, looking up descriptions of charges on their mobile bill, will follow, sheeplike with “me too” rip-off stories until the commentary is epidemic. Customer Service is no longer just answering the phone with a sweet voice. It has to evolve to deal with these issues and it involves everyone in the customer value chain to ensure that support of the confused consumer is good, billing information is meaningful and there is a robust evidential trail of the consumer journey through payments to the product. Rory runs rmCommerce Ltd., a specialist consultancy dealing with all areas of mobile payments, working with a number of clients, including ImpulsePay.

OPINION SECURITY

Brave new world of

MONETISATION?

A global MEF survey reveals that nearly two thirds of consumers are wary of sharing private data with apps. But with data rapidly becoming the monetisation tool for the new app economy, this needs to change. Paul Skeldon investigates data is becoming the new currency of apps. Without the valuable data that can then be sold on, the millions of people who play Angry Birds for 69p rather than £6.99 would be a bit nonplussed. Data is now a currency. But a recent global study of 9500 people carried out by MEF and OnDevice Research has found that only a third of consumers are comfortable sharing data through apps – meaning that a massive two thirds are not. And this is hampering the development of m-commerce and stifling the nascent data trade – while the third who are sharing data are likely to get a massive shock when they find out what it is being used for. All in all, it’s a mess. “There are two factors at work here,” says Simon Bates, Senior Advisor, policy and initiatives at MEF, “security around how the data is stored and used and privacy issues around what data is being shared and with whom.” Right now, apps that sit on smartphones, theoretically at least, can access and share everything pretty much that is in that phone. Location is the obvious one – and the one that you most often get asked if its ok to share – but apps can also share your contacts, your photos, your browsing history, your social media trail and much more. And this is starting to worry people. “70% of people want to know what is being shared by apps and 46% think its vitally important to know what is being shared by their apps,” says Bates, but typically that transparency isn’t there he warns. Apps stores such as Google and Apple have strict privacy policies and many free apps – 69% according to The Future Privacy Forum in the US – have their own strict privacy policies in place. However, with 70% of consumers wary about privacy, the message is not getting through.

And this is where the MEF comes in. According to Bates, the free app market is like the next stage of development in currency: we used to barter, then we had coins, now we use data. This is a crucial facet of how the free and lowcost app market works – consumers get apps free in return for the apps developer selling the consumers data. But making sure that this is ethical – and above all transparent – is becoming crucial. While apps stores and app developers and brands all seem to be taking privacy and data seriously, they typically just sell on the data they gather to ad networks – and no one can vouch for what they do with it. Many of the main ad networks such as AdMobi all have their own strict privacy rules, but not all do. And this is where it gets messy. In order for the mobile advertising market to work – and for apps to be free or low cost – these issues of privacy have to be tackled and made transparent. “They also have to be communicated to the consumer,” says Bates. “It is no good ticking the ‘privacy’ box by having a 40 page legal document on a website from a link in the app, it has to be clear and simple and presented to the consumer at the right point in the process. Otherwise, the consumer mistrust will grow and the potential that this data market offers will be hurt.” The MEF is already working with leading brands, ad networks and developers to create tools to make this easier to do and to help everyone make the issue of data transparent. And it needs to happen fast. The global research finds that developing markets, counter to what you might have assumed, are actually more concerned about these privacy issues than developed US and European markets – so all future expansion of m-commerce hinges on getting this right.

ANALYSIS

Game

M-GAMING

of Phones

The gaming and gambling industry gets that mobile is a key platform, but does it yet fully understand what mobile’s role across its whole business actually is? Paul Skeldon finds that the real power of mobile in gambling goes way beyond just putting out an app or m-site since about 1997, each year has been dubbed the year of mobile – but we can say now with some authority that 2012 was actually the year of mobile. How do I know? Because now every sector that has toyed with mobile technology to improve its business now gets it and is moving from using mobile as a platform to having to fully understand how the power of mobile technology is something that goes way beyond just mobilising the services they already do on other channels. There are two places where this has become achingly true: retail and gambling. Today, brands in these two vertical markets – which do share some links, not least in some instances high street shops – are looking beyond just getting an app or m-website, and are starting to see how mobile, to use an hoary old cliché, is the glue that binds channels together. With the mGaming Summit taking place in London on 24 April it is interesting to note that much of the content is still focussed on the basics, rather than delving into the true value mobile brings to the sector. It’s not about apps verses web any more (see panel). It’s not even about designing mobile services. Rather it is now about the fundamental place that mobile needs to take within a gambling operator’s business as part of the customer experience. “You need to look now at how your business has a mobile strategy right across the board,” says Siamac Rezaiezadeh, strategic account executive at OpenMarket, one of the key sponsors of mGaming Summit and its sister show mSports Summit. “you product teams certainly need a mobile strategy, but so too do your operations teams and customer support teams. Its all about how you now use mobile as a whole business to interact with your customers and deliver a customer experience.” The idea is that not only are more consumers playing gambling games through their handsets, but also the mobile is the place where you can most easily reach out to them too. “So you have to have a strategy for mobile that reaches right across the company as it all helps drive customer experience, which in turn is the key to both acquisition and retention of customers,” says Rezaiezadeh. And this is really what mobile is about: it isn’t so much just a place to gamble – with the rise of tablets, web-enabled TV and smartphones, the actually mode of playing online or mobile is becoming blurred; its all just playing. Rather mobile is now a channel through which to beef up existing acquisition and retention technologies (and perhaps invent a few new ones along the way). Acquisition position The acquisition part of mobile’s role in gambling is the real indicator of how it binds the whole business together – and it is good old SMS that holds the key, believes Rezaiezadeh. “It is all about calls to action and it covers everything from

adverts, billboards, TV and shops – you put text <shortcode> and you have people engaged. If you can get them to engage through mobile then there is a good chance of converting them,” he says. Within that text engagement the gaming operator needs embed a click here to bet now or at the very least a link to a site, if not a place to download the app and play. If they are already signed up with you then you can send them off to play straightaway. If not, then send them to the registration page and give them some sort of cool introductory offer. This is all standard marketing stuff – albeit initiated from many different starting points thanks to mobile’s ubiquity – but mobile offers one other really interesting (and much under-rated) engagement tool: payments. OK, so the mobile media is rife with tales of the power of mobile payments – choosing to usually focus on NFC, mobile wallets and Weve – but simple Payforit or PSMS operator billing payments actually hold the key to acquisition of mobile players. “Putting the cost of something onto your phone bill with one or two clicks takes all the friction out of the process,” says OpenMarket’s Rezaiezadeh. “It can also create new gamers.” The idea is simple: signing up new players over mobile can be instigated by a text call to action, but once you have them you need to make it as easy as possible to engage them while they are interested. Getting them to sign up, add a card and so on from a smartphone keyboard is a huge hurdle. But if you can build into the marketing the process that you can just pay through your mobile then you have a frictionless way to get them to sign up and start playing straightaway. Arguments that operators take too big a slice of the money are also starting to fade, making this process ever more attractive. “Operators now allow one of payments of up to £30 via SMS on mobile and outpayments are up around 85%,” says Rezaiezadeh. “As this is an acquisition tool, these costs can be built into the cost of acquisition and figures are starting to stack up.” But what is perhaps more interesting is that mobile payments and text calls to action can start to monetise a whole new demographic of players: the regulator small stakes players, who pop £5 a day on and play once or twice a day for small stakes. “OpenMarket also pioneered mobile crediting so we can put money onto pre-pay phones or contract bills so that as part of your offer you can actually give people money to play with on their mobile,” says Rezaiezadeh. It may sound small fry, but there are many of them, so it’s a potentially very valuable sector to chase, believes Rezaiezadeh. And simple SMS marketing and calls to action, coupled with frictionless mobile payments make it ever more likely to capitalise these players.

ANALYSIS

M-GAMING

Retention dimension As we have seen, mobile is in people’s hand, metaphorically at least, pretty much all the time and, while its clearly got a lot of leverage with customer acquisition and enticement of new players, it can also be used to keep the players you have. This is where the idea that mobile can underpin everything you do comes into play. Its about how to market to people directly through mobile – using many of the techniques discussed above around acquisition – but it is also about how to use mobile in the customer service and wider customer experience environment that is where mobile becomes a retention tool. The real key – as with everything in mobile – is to understand the customers you have and use that data to build better services for them and give them the offers they want.

Old foes: Apps vs HTML5 One of the biggest debates in mobile commerce – within

which we lump mobile gambling – is whether operators should go down the native apps or the m-web route to service customers. Looking generally at the consumer market, apps seem to be ‘winning’. A study by Compuware found that 85% of consumers find apps more convenient and offer a much better experience. This is something certainly born out within the gambling sector: apps are richer and deeper. However, just because consumers appear to prefer apps, does that mean that they are the best way of running your mobile gambling services? As Henry Ford said about his cars: “If I had asked people what they wanted they’d have asked for a faster horse”. The biggest two issues with apps is that firstly it is hard to get people to find your’s rather than your competitors apps and secondly that updating them is a royal pain in the proverbial. Apps stores are full of apps and unless someone knows your brand name or game name they are not necessarily going to find your app and download it and give you their money. Also, once it is on the phone, will they bother to find it again to use it? 75% of apps are used once then forgotten. Of course, mobile marketing as discussed in the main part of this article can help with that, so this isn’t an insurmountable problem. However, the issue of updating apps is. It takes time to get updates to apps written, approved and loaded to apps stores. The updated apps then have to be pushed at the users who then have to be bothered to download them. This process can take as much as two months, so

“If, say, you are at a Rugby match and you have a bet on the England will score first and Wales do, then send out an SMS saying “bad luck: but why not bet on England scoring next at these odds?”,” says Rezaiezadeh. “Its all about targetted messaging and understanding what consumers want.” And this is the real mobile challenge facing gaming operators: making sure they have the data at their finger tips and are ready to slice and dice it in unusual and reactive ways to make it useful. “Gambling operators are getting this and some are ready to make it happen, but it’s the biggest challenge right now – they have to understand what data they have, what data they need to gather and then how to use it to create new marketing products,” says Rezaiezadeh. This, then, is the real mGambling challenge: gathering data about your users and then using it intelligently and with agility.

realistically you are looking at being able to update your app, at best, four or five times a year only. “This is simply not enough for any gambling service,” says Gary Wimbridge from technology provider Aditi. “The key to keeping casino and poker players interested is in offering new games, which means updates, even to the look and feel. For Bingo and Lotteries, the money often comes from the services offered around the main game, which again needs keeping fresh. For sports bets it’s a nightmare as the games, odds and players change daily. So updating via an apps store is clearly not ideal. Plus, not all apps stores offer gambling games.” The answer of course is to go down the web route and start using HTML5 and adaptive web design that allows a build (and update) once and distribute anywhere model. But you lose some of the richness and experience. “This is a trade off that gambling opeators and players have to be prepared to make,” believes Wimbridge. “HTML5 will start to improve design of m-websites and the experience will improve, but the updating process for the operator will be much easier.” The key development, Wimbridge believes, is that these HTML5 websites will start to sit behind things that look like apps, so that consumers think they are using an app but get all the advantages of an updatable web presence. It also offers the scalability needed to service an ever growing range of devices and iterations of existing devices. So, while consumers may think they prefer apps, many will probably be playing HTML5 hybrid web apps without knowing it and the app vs HTML5 debate will have a real winner: the web.

ANALYSIS

M-GAMING

Game on For social gambling There is a huge opportunity for gaming operators and mobile developers to capture the hearts and minds of eager players with the emerging category of Social Mobile Gaming. Andrew Darling takes a look at why it is so important to telemedia and the gaming industry gambling game on the platform – Bingo Friendzy – it was made available exclusively in the UK first and served to remind traditional industry operators that smaller, agile companies can also enter the industry and claim market share. One of the most important factors behind the success of Facebook gambling applications and mobile social gaming applications is the extreme professionalism of online gambling services. Now, most of the online gambling sites have social media apps integrated in them. These social media apps accomplish two objectives; they keep the current users happy and they help in attracting new users from the social media sites. They use Facebook fan pages and twitter accounts to expand their reach

lying at the intersection of three powerful markets – social gaming, online gambling/sports betting and mobile gambling/sports betting – Social Mobile Gaming marries the power of social games with the reach, scale and ability of mobile to monetise. With Social Mobile (SoMo), gambling and sports betting will move to the next level. While investors were jumping from the social gaming ship in droves during 2012, there was one area that did not get the short end of the stick: namely, social gambling, which continues to attract investor attention. Clearly, social gambling on mobile devices is rising up the strategic agenda and is expected to make headlines more and more this year and next. There can be little doubt that gambling and betting are social activities. Whether the customer is in a land-based casino, a bookies or playing poker on their laptop, they are engaged and involved with other people – real or virtual. Social games leverage a player’s social graph, in the form of a social network, to motivate and drive game play. Social casino games can couple the ‘stickiness’ of social games with the classic popularity of casino games such as Blackjack, slots, roulette and poker. Growth in all these markets is projected to accelerate this year, fuelled by the slew of investments in 2012 by the likes of IGT buying social gaming company DoubleDown which has contributed to an explosion of social games on Facebook. And it’s not just the big players who are shaking things up: When Facebook announced the first real-money

Harnessing the power Innovative gaming and sports betting operators are harnessing the tremendous opportunity to combine three technologies where users spend most of their time; social media, online gambling and mobile phones. Mobile social gaming applications have successfully achieved this objective. These applications are so efficient; users can use them even when they are at work. One of the experiments in this area is something called “SideBets,” an app that can be purchased and downloaded for either the Android or iPhone, which basically allows participants to place peer-to-peer bets which each other on the honour system, a mechanism that circumvents regulations by eliminating paying and collecting function. Fans contact each other, use established sports book odds as a medium, and settle the wagers between themselves, although they must buy SBD’s (Side Bet Dollars) in order to be integrated into the system. Juniper Research projects that annual wagers that will be placed via smart phones and tablet devices will exceed $100 billion by the year 2017, and it will be social gambling that is the main driver. The reason is relatively simple. It’s because the social gaming companies, like Zynga, will be gravitating more toward real money gambling as a way to generate revenues, and eventually it will become the standard for the industry. Certainly there will be more of this to come. People connect so much on their phones right now that doing so within the context of a gambling exercise would seem to be a given. And whatever comes next would seem to only be limited by the power of the imagination, as the social gaming market reaches new boundaries on mobile devices.

ANALYSIS

mSPORT SUMMIT

M-SPORT

Scoring WITH mobile sport With record digital device shipments and a growing interest in monetising sports content and ‘experience’ via mobile, mSPORT it looks like teaming telemedia services and sports is the dream team. Ahead SofU mSports Summit, Matthew Leach MMIT investigates what is on offer and how to make it score Strategies for mastering xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

it has to be said that Mobile World Exciting times lie ahead for the sports and telecoms industries. If they can work as a team and offer the right content at the right price, they will surely tap into the fans’‘passion points’. There will be a revolution in the way supporters consume content before, during and after a match, inside or outside the stadium, and could be the pot of gold that sports clubs and telemedia players have been talking about for years. According to a recent forecast from Canalys, worldwide mobile device shipments (notebooks, tablets, smartphones and phones) will reach 2.6 billion by 2016. If correct, this provides a great opportunity for the telemedia industry to work with sports and the entertainment industry to add value to the fans’ experience. Innovative mobile content can increase monetisation and create a large customer database, which is invaluable to advertisers and sponsors. The main obstacle to the fans being given access to an allsinging, all-dancing multi-media experience, while watching their team live, is the lack of wireless-enabled stadiums. When stadiums in the UK are fully connected fans can expect: • Mobile ticketing • An ability to order food, beverages and merchandise • Access to player and game stats in real time • Instant replays

• In-play betting • Navigation around the stadium One such company aiming to make Wi-Fi enabled stadiums a reality is Sports Revolution, a sports media and marketing group and in-stadia media rights holders in the UK. Sports Revolution represents 16 Premier League football clubs and its name could be appropriate, the company insisting it has overcome the challenge of turning stadiums from digital black spots to Wi-Fi hotspots. Martin Copus, Sport Revolution’s director of digital, said: “For the last 18 months we have been putting together the technical capability of stadium Wi-Fi for the rights holders, making sure the business models are appealing for all parties. At the beginning of next season we will see the first Wi-Fi stadium installation for 50,000-plus seats. “Stadium Wi-Fi technology has been around for a while, but getting it right from a commercial perspective for the rights holders and advertisers, and to some extent the fans, is the tricky part.” There is already a high penetration of smartphones in this country and that is set to grow. Canalys believes that in 2016, smartphone shipments will double the 695 million achieved in 2012. Copus insists that this smartphone adoption rate will enhance the match-day experience for the fans and increase the

ANALYSIS

M-SPORT

mSPORT SUMMIT

‘dwell time’, with fans arriving at the stadium earlier and leaving later, to access the added value services on offer. “Football fans’ ownership of smartphones is above the national average because, if you are passionate about sport it is predicated on multimedia, so these fans are drawn to a device that delivers multimedia, irrespective of their socio-economic situation. But the big issue for delivering mobile services for sport fans is that a lot of stadiums are black spots as far as signal strength and bandwidth is concerned.” Atlas Premium Brands chief executive Nigel Tatlock does not believe the increase in smartphone penetration is the great driver that many claim. His company distributes branded media content through mobile apps, and the web, as well as social memSPORT deals with many of football’s biggest S U Mdia, Mand I including: Tboasts exclusive names Real Madrid, Chelsea, Manchester City, PSG, es for mastering Interxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Milan and Marseille. Tatlock said: “The birth of smartphones has not helped. The sale of content is on the descendency, while the desire is on the ascendency, as kids are very clever at ripping off content from the internet. Football clubs are very lapsed in addressing this issue, but they need to slap some legs because it is costing them money.” Copus believes that when other clubs see that the proposition works, they will be eager to get in on the act. He said: “We have a waiting list of clubs. They understand the concept of Wi-Fi stadium, though each proposition will be a little different - depending on the size of the stadium. Size does matter, for example, the audience level, which advertisers and sponsors will look at that, and also the technical challenge to make sure fans have a great experience. “The portal sits on top of the technical platform and the fan will use his mobile phone to register and have access to all the media capabilities on offer. It can offer such services as in-play betting and looking at the pitch from different camera angles, creating an enhanced match-day experience.” As a large proportion of football fans already participate in in-play betting, Copus believes this could be a good way to monetise these new connected venues with fans able to access betting while watching a live match, for the first time. The stats seem to back Copus’s confidence. According to Juniper Research’s report, the mobile betting market is expected to reach $45 billion by 2017 with betting from mobile devices across all types of gambling expected to hit $100 billion by 2017. Tatlock, although more interested in focusing on the millions of supporters around the world, rather than just those in the stadium, can see the possibilities of in-play betting. He said: “Wireless-enabled stadiums will help football clubs but it is more about the experience you can give to fans, not the 46,000 that turn up week-in, week-out, but the millions around the world.

“As far as in-play betting is concerned, you could get the betting company to pay for the wireless network and they would have exclusive rights in the stadium. At Manchester United, Bwin are still taking paper bets, and corporate clients can be lazy and won’t walk the 50 yards to return the slips. If they had tablets, they could place bets at their leisure and people get a lot looser with their cash when they’ve had a few beers. At United, there are 15,000 corporate seats, 5,000 of which change on a weekly basis, these are prospective new accounts with people spending from £10 to £1000 per bet.” Tatlock believes that instead of looking for the transactional value that these connected stadiums could provide, telemedia companies should think about the bigger picture. Tatlock said: “We take the clubs’ digital assets and help them monetise them and build their CRM. Clubs try to engage with fans and equally brands want to engage with them. Brands need to be seen to be getting value for money. As a brand owner, yes you want to be associated with success but you want to interact with that consumer market. APB helps clubs break into emerging markets. We helped Chelsea go from just a few supporters in Indonesia to 3 million CRM and increased their Facebook presence to a million users.” APB is an expert in the field of using social media around sports brands to help the fans engage with their clubs and the company recently acquired real-time sports news feed Tweetsport. Tatlock says: “It gathers Twitter feeds from players, like Rio Ferdinand and Michael Vaughan, clubs and associations etc. and gives you something fresh, allowing consumers to communicate and share content with friends while watching the game. It is monetised through sponsorship, advertising such as banner ads, merchandise sales, ticketing and video on demand.” Social media is a subtle but effective tool to engage with fans who are more interested in hearing the views of their peers (ie their fellow fan) than the powers that be (the club). Matthew Bowden, account manager at Velti, one of the world’s largest mobile marketing communication agencies, envisages a future where sport and social media will be working increasingly close together. Bowden said: “In the US political campaign they weren’t just using Twitter and Facebook, they were using things like Instagram. This is the way the clubs should go, showing images of players in the dressing room, letting the fans into that world, making them feel part of the club, using those channels of rich media content. Things like tweeting by a club can feel a bit contrived, but content can play a much wider role using things like Vine, Instagram and even videos on YouTube which can go viral.” Tatlock agrees it is all about engagement, creating that stickiness so that the fans will come back and interact with your brand again. He said: “You want the kids to come back, clubs

mSP SUM

ANALYSIS

M-SPORT

mSPORT SUMMIT

can be very narrow-minded in getting their £3 out of someone, because it is a one-time URL and linked to his IP address. We when in reality they should be concentrating on page impresare anti-SEO and guarantee our clients that we will never sions, building up the customer base and giving them value for appear on Google. Artists do not want to be seen to be in the money.” bargain basement of Woolys, so you need to tread really careTatlock believes the big teams will have their own social netfully with agents and A-list celebrities.” work eventually. He said: “Social media is just the start, teams like Although the solution has already proved itself many times Real Madrid and Manchester United should run their own social over in the live music market, Massey is frustrated that football networks. If you look at Facebook, and its alleged 800 million clubs seem reluctant to try it. “There is a real issue with season users, Man United would gain significant value by building its ticket holders at football matches being no shows, our SMS or own Facebook.” ping to mobile apps is a ready-made solution to allow season Although, in terms finance, the sports industry, and the ticket holders to offload their tickets, make money and give football industry in particular, bucks the trend as far as the other people a chance to go to a game. It is win-win for everyeconomic downturn is concerned. There is a warning to any body. But because of the threat of hooliganism, football clubs telemedia companies that want to crack the sports market mSPORT are more controlling.” S U Massey M M Ibelieves T – buying content rights can be incredibly expensive and that ticketing will inevitably end up using Strategies xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx you might not always recoup what you invest. Tatlock said: for mastering NFC, which will sit in the guts of the smartphone, but believes “Regarding content rights issues, we have built up a library of it is going to be a slow burner. “NFC is one protocol, RFID, the extensive licences, with clubs, leagues and associations. But whole thing is just one kit, so once it is there a million service it is expensive. A lot of people coming into the market think providers can do stuff with it.” it will be cheap, but it is not. It costs around £80,000 for the LST COO Stephen Ebanks has first-hand knowledge of footdigital rights of one club for an emerging market. MTN paid ball’s quest to go digital. He was head of sales and marketing £55 million over three years for Manchester United’s digital at Coventry City in 2010, which was home of the first cashless rights, how are they going to recoup that?” stadium in the UK. The system was intended to reduce the time Mobile ticketing is seen as a key driver in the quest to bring fans spent queuing at matches, whether it was for tickets, or sport and mobile services together and this, done correctly, can food and beverages and was based on NFC-type technology, not only save the sports fan, or music lover, money but enable MiFare Classic RFID chip. them to engage with the brands they love. One such company Although Ebanks admitted there was much scepticism blazing a trail in the ticketing market is Last Second Tickets. The from the fans at first because it was, they felt “forced upon company provides distressed inventory to a closed-user group. them”, he insisted that they came round to the idea. “It They sell tickets for live music concerts, theatre, and sporting worked really well, allowing fans easy access to the ground, events, such as boxing and football. They are especially focused giving them the ability to top up online and buy food and on mobile and the mobile channel, ensuring they have a full beverages using their card. It also enabled the club to plan cross-platform offering. ahead, as they understood what sold best in what particular Craig Massey, LST chief executive, said: “We are very focused section of the Ricoh Arena.” on unsold tickets in the last seven days, a third of all pre-bought Ebanks, too, believes that NFC will take mobile ticketing to the tickets remain unsold. We work with venues and promoters. next level, insisting, “There were problems with cashless contact Once we are given an event and a geographical area, we tag it cards, its technology is not in the same realm as NFC. While and, working with our database partners, for example Orange, NFC is very open, MiFare is very locked down – it takes a huge Virgin, Confused.com, we cherry pick who is most likely to be process to say who has access to the chip.” interested in a particular event. Then we notify them using SMS Connected stadium access, the advent of NFC technology with a link to the mobile internet, email or a push notification to and the increasingly symbiotic relationship between sport and a mobile app. social media will be the key drivers for sports clubs/brands and “We hunt and seek out pockets of people and have built telemedia companies to feed content to hungry fans and in turn a proprietary platform called Tribes. But if we have added generate profit. New territories and markets also represent a big value, such as a discount or VIP upgrade, we have to hide opportunity, especially in football where the Premier League is them, because the last thing the promoter wants is to canloved around the world. It is not just about the developing marnibalise ticket sales. For example, if we forward a football sup- kets of Africa, Asia and India (for cricket) though, North America porter an offer of a discounted ticket and he forwards it on to is finally taking football, or ‘soccer’, to its heart and could once his mate who tries the link, it will come up ‘page not found’, again be the land of opportunity.

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Mobile Gambling & Mobile Sport Today’s big thing; tomorrow’s competitive edge

obile is no longer the ‘next big thing’ in gambling or sports (or anything else for that matter), it’s now an essential platform for today’s progressive high value online sectors. Research also suggests that mobile particularly attracts new, younger more sports-minded customers to gambling, while still driving higher yields from existing gamblers. Combined with the vast array of new billing and

direct marketing tools, companies with a strong mobile proposition look set to gain the biggest share of this hugely lucrative market opportunity. The sport industry is also seeing an influx of mobile technologies that connect fans to events, teams, brands and the athletes themselves through mobile websites, apps and social media. This year the mGaming Summit and the mSport Summit will run on the same day in recognition of the clear synergies between these two industry sectors. This we will enable both del-

egates and sponsors to participate in the Sports and Gambling Sessions plus all other scheduled networking events.