Next week looks as if it is shaping up to be broadband week with both Orange and Vodafone expected to announce their strategies in the forthcoming converged services market.
With Carphone Warehouse already offering ‘free’ broadband through TalkTalk – a claim that is continuing to attract complaints from the public and rivals to the ASA – both Orange, who will gain full broadband services after merging fully with Wanadoo next week, and Vodafone, who are hotly tipped to buy an ISP soon to offer services, want to get in on the act.
The converged services market is shaping up to be more confusing than getting a new mobile contract – trying to work out your best deal usually requires a maths degree and a lot of patience – and each player will be offering a combination of discounts set against other parts of its business.
But who will emerge victorious? BT has a strong hold on the broadband market and so could, theoretically, manoeuvre this into the converged services market with a mobile play, but BT Fusion is not proving very popular. Vodafone has a great brand in mobile, but no broadband heritage at all and will have to move fast and pay big to bring some in.
Orange is without a doubt the best placed. It has a good mobile brand and with the backing of France Telecom and a £130m marketing campaign to rebrand Wanadoo as Orange next week, will be making a big impact on the market from the start of converged services.
Thursday, May 25, 2006
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
MTV Gets The Urge
MTV is setting out its stall to try and reclaim its music territory that has been land-grabbed in the past few years by Apple.
It’s launching ‘Urge’ as its new music download service offering users 2 million songs that can be bought either separately for $0.99 (£0.53) or via a monthly subscription. Urge will also be the featured music player on Microsoft's Media Player and will be compatible with more than 100 digital music players but not iPods.
Van Toffler, president of MTV Networks Music Group actually said: "We will concentrate on people who don't have iPods. Hopefully, through the TV channels we have and the dot-com sites...we can educate people about the virtues of subscriptions. It's not about selling a million singles.”
MTV, credited with giving rise to a generation of music loving teenagers and being the driving force behind popular culture in 90s America, has since lost its way because it has not embraced the changing nature of media consumption. The fact that a computer company such as Apple has managed to do this must be infuriating for MTV suits.
Someone told me the other day that YouTube has a greater reach in the US than MTV. That is the perfect example of how MTV has missed the boat, by being too slow to adapt to the changing market.
The YouTube model is simple yet effective; it is a media company that relies on interaction from its audience. That sounds remarkably similar to MTV in many ways and yet MTV is only now embracing music downloads as a medium in a meaningful way and cannot match YouTube for the amount of music video clips that are being posted and viewed. Music download is not a new phenomenon and there were plenty of signs it would take off even before it was introduced as a legal business, but still it has taken MTV until now to launch a service that fits so centrally with its brand.
To be fair to MTV, it is far from the channel that launched in 1981 with the exclamation "Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll!" But even taking into account the size of the Viacom owned company now it is a surprise that it has not reacted more quickly to a changing media environment.
What will be interesting to see now is how much of its coolness is still left? Does MTV still resonate with the youth of today, or are YouTube and the iPod their idols now?
It’s launching ‘Urge’ as its new music download service offering users 2 million songs that can be bought either separately for $0.99 (£0.53) or via a monthly subscription. Urge will also be the featured music player on Microsoft's Media Player and will be compatible with more than 100 digital music players but not iPods.
Van Toffler, president of MTV Networks Music Group actually said: "We will concentrate on people who don't have iPods. Hopefully, through the TV channels we have and the dot-com sites...we can educate people about the virtues of subscriptions. It's not about selling a million singles.”
MTV, credited with giving rise to a generation of music loving teenagers and being the driving force behind popular culture in 90s America, has since lost its way because it has not embraced the changing nature of media consumption. The fact that a computer company such as Apple has managed to do this must be infuriating for MTV suits.
Someone told me the other day that YouTube has a greater reach in the US than MTV. That is the perfect example of how MTV has missed the boat, by being too slow to adapt to the changing market.
The YouTube model is simple yet effective; it is a media company that relies on interaction from its audience. That sounds remarkably similar to MTV in many ways and yet MTV is only now embracing music downloads as a medium in a meaningful way and cannot match YouTube for the amount of music video clips that are being posted and viewed. Music download is not a new phenomenon and there were plenty of signs it would take off even before it was introduced as a legal business, but still it has taken MTV until now to launch a service that fits so centrally with its brand.
To be fair to MTV, it is far from the channel that launched in 1981 with the exclamation "Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll!" But even taking into account the size of the Viacom owned company now it is a surprise that it has not reacted more quickly to a changing media environment.
What will be interesting to see now is how much of its coolness is still left? Does MTV still resonate with the youth of today, or are YouTube and the iPod their idols now?
Monday, May 15, 2006
The Geeks Will Inherit The Earth
Last week Internet search giant Google’s chief executive Eric Schmidt told the BBC that staying quiet about its operations was no longer an option.
"We are doing too many things that people care about to keep our mouths shut," Schmidt said. "We have to tell people what we are working on so they can anticipate where we're going."
Anyone who works in the press and has dealt with Google will find this highly amusing, but nonetheless Google invited the world's media to Googleplex headquarters in California to talk about new developments.
Mr Schmidt said he believed that competition in the Internet search business, especially from Microsoft and Yahoo! would drive up prices and increase revenue rather than threaten them and that Google appeared to be benefiting from its ‘limitless growth model’, with profits in the first three months of 2006 up 60% to $592m (£333m), from $372m a year ago.
Mr Schmidt is undoubtedly a very smart man, and Google is making vast amounts of cash, but anyone claiming to have a ‘limitless growth model’ needs to have their head read, or at least sit down for a while.
Those of us that went through the late nineties and early noughties saw first hand the pride that come before a fall when terms such as ‘limitless growth’ and ‘exponential’ are bandied around.
Google should take a look at how Microsoft has been treated in its rise to dominance in the computing world; Anti-trust cases await Google, you can count on that.
But on the upside for Google, it has made a great start in the time that it has taken for its competitors to catch up. Schmidt is right again to identify Yahoo! and MSN as its main competitors, but it will be MSN’s relationship with Microsoft that will be the real battle for Google. It will be interesting to see how ‘limitless’ its growth is when it comes face to face with Microsoft on a more regular basis in search and advertising circles, as Microsoft sets out its stall to be a major player in both.
"We are doing too many things that people care about to keep our mouths shut," Schmidt said. "We have to tell people what we are working on so they can anticipate where we're going."
Anyone who works in the press and has dealt with Google will find this highly amusing, but nonetheless Google invited the world's media to Googleplex headquarters in California to talk about new developments.
Mr Schmidt said he believed that competition in the Internet search business, especially from Microsoft and Yahoo! would drive up prices and increase revenue rather than threaten them and that Google appeared to be benefiting from its ‘limitless growth model’, with profits in the first three months of 2006 up 60% to $592m (£333m), from $372m a year ago.
Mr Schmidt is undoubtedly a very smart man, and Google is making vast amounts of cash, but anyone claiming to have a ‘limitless growth model’ needs to have their head read, or at least sit down for a while.
Those of us that went through the late nineties and early noughties saw first hand the pride that come before a fall when terms such as ‘limitless growth’ and ‘exponential’ are bandied around.
Google should take a look at how Microsoft has been treated in its rise to dominance in the computing world; Anti-trust cases await Google, you can count on that.
But on the upside for Google, it has made a great start in the time that it has taken for its competitors to catch up. Schmidt is right again to identify Yahoo! and MSN as its main competitors, but it will be MSN’s relationship with Microsoft that will be the real battle for Google. It will be interesting to see how ‘limitless’ its growth is when it comes face to face with Microsoft on a more regular basis in search and advertising circles, as Microsoft sets out its stall to be a major player in both.
Monday, May 08, 2006
Search Wars Part III - Revenge of the Portals
Yahoo! has fired the latest salvo in the search marketing wars with the announcement of the Q3 launch of a new search marketing platform in the UK.
The new service, like that announced by MSN last week has enhanced targeting capabilities allowing advertisers to use Yahoo!’s WhereonEarth technology to target and match users to content. Google announced a demographic enhancement to its service in April.
Other new features include added campaign testing and evaluation tools as well as a goal based optimisation service that Yahoo! says will allow you to control campaigns based on goals such as cost per acquisition.
Stephen Taylor, Regional Vice President - Yahoo! Search said that the move was all about ‘putting the advertiser in control of the medium’.
This is the way that the whole industry is moving in the UK and globally. MSN adCenter is designed to be very agency and advertiser friendly and SEM’s have commented that MSN have been a ‘breath of fresh air’ in their approach to the market. Yahoo! like MSN is also looking beyond the traditional paid search market, with Taylor identifying ‘huge opportunity’ in how it will work with graphical media, mobile, IPTV and with enhanced geo-targeting.
Both Yahoo! and MSN have strong audiences and will both be exploiting advertising across all aspects of their networks, MSN across properties including Windows Live and Xbox and Yahoo! with a social search focus using its properties including Flickr.
Google does not have the audience that both Yahoo! and MSN have. Sure, it is a first stop for most Web users when they search online, but it is a conduit to get somewhere else.
Whether advertisers remain thinking that the value is in the delivery of traffic, or whether this will evolve into how they interact with the traffic, will have a large bearing on who comes out on top in the search wars.
The new service, like that announced by MSN last week has enhanced targeting capabilities allowing advertisers to use Yahoo!’s WhereonEarth technology to target and match users to content. Google announced a demographic enhancement to its service in April.
Other new features include added campaign testing and evaluation tools as well as a goal based optimisation service that Yahoo! says will allow you to control campaigns based on goals such as cost per acquisition.
Stephen Taylor, Regional Vice President - Yahoo! Search said that the move was all about ‘putting the advertiser in control of the medium’.
This is the way that the whole industry is moving in the UK and globally. MSN adCenter is designed to be very agency and advertiser friendly and SEM’s have commented that MSN have been a ‘breath of fresh air’ in their approach to the market. Yahoo! like MSN is also looking beyond the traditional paid search market, with Taylor identifying ‘huge opportunity’ in how it will work with graphical media, mobile, IPTV and with enhanced geo-targeting.
Both Yahoo! and MSN have strong audiences and will both be exploiting advertising across all aspects of their networks, MSN across properties including Windows Live and Xbox and Yahoo! with a social search focus using its properties including Flickr.
Google does not have the audience that both Yahoo! and MSN have. Sure, it is a first stop for most Web users when they search online, but it is a conduit to get somewhere else.
Whether advertisers remain thinking that the value is in the delivery of traffic, or whether this will evolve into how they interact with the traffic, will have a large bearing on who comes out on top in the search wars.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
Search Shenanigans
MSN today announced that it would begin testing its online marketing adCenter product in the UK in June with a full rollout expected later in the year.
The UK market has been waiting for this date for a year, ever since MSN announced at the launch of the service in the US at its 6th Annual Strategic Account Summit in March 2005.
The service is billed as the advertising engine for Windows Live, MSN and other Microsoft online services including Xbox.com and Xbox Live connected gaming. It has already been used in the US by DoubleClick’s performance based marketing division.
But what will it actually mean for the industry?
The UK market has been reliant on Google, Yahoo! and MIVA for its search marketing needs for the last few years and MSN was conspicuous by its absence. Today’s announcement may herald a new dawn for advertisers and search agencies in the UK, offering a genuine fourth alternative.
However, there are a number of questions that adCenter must answer before it is hailed as a success in the UK.
Firstly, Google has a massive head start over MSN in terms of users on its search service.
Secondly, Yahoo! can compete as portal for eyeballs in the UK, so there is no guarantee that the new adCenter will attract more business to the MSN portal. Add AOL to that point as well.
Thirdly, and although it is nauseating, Google constantly reminds everyone that they are in this game for the users, to give them the most relevant results, whereas the MSN play – if an initial glance of the offering is correct – seems to lean towards the advertiser, with the promise of being able to deliver ads to different demographics, rather than purely on keyword searches. So in theory the user does not get the most relevant results, just the most relevant ones for the advertiser.
Lastly – well for this list as it could go on for a while –will MSN offer a 15% agency discount when adCenter is introduced? A move that would be the opposite of that taken by both Yahoo! and Google, which removed the discounts in favour of other systems. Would seem suicide so will have to wait and see.
MSN will have to answer these questions and more if it is to wrestle control of the UK PPC market from Google and Yahoo! and MIVA, its going to be an interesting summer for search marketers.
The UK market has been waiting for this date for a year, ever since MSN announced at the launch of the service in the US at its 6th Annual Strategic Account Summit in March 2005.
The service is billed as the advertising engine for Windows Live, MSN and other Microsoft online services including Xbox.com and Xbox Live connected gaming. It has already been used in the US by DoubleClick’s performance based marketing division.
But what will it actually mean for the industry?
The UK market has been reliant on Google, Yahoo! and MIVA for its search marketing needs for the last few years and MSN was conspicuous by its absence. Today’s announcement may herald a new dawn for advertisers and search agencies in the UK, offering a genuine fourth alternative.
However, there are a number of questions that adCenter must answer before it is hailed as a success in the UK.
Firstly, Google has a massive head start over MSN in terms of users on its search service.
Secondly, Yahoo! can compete as portal for eyeballs in the UK, so there is no guarantee that the new adCenter will attract more business to the MSN portal. Add AOL to that point as well.
Thirdly, and although it is nauseating, Google constantly reminds everyone that they are in this game for the users, to give them the most relevant results, whereas the MSN play – if an initial glance of the offering is correct – seems to lean towards the advertiser, with the promise of being able to deliver ads to different demographics, rather than purely on keyword searches. So in theory the user does not get the most relevant results, just the most relevant ones for the advertiser.
Lastly – well for this list as it could go on for a while –will MSN offer a 15% agency discount when adCenter is introduced? A move that would be the opposite of that taken by both Yahoo! and Google, which removed the discounts in favour of other systems. Would seem suicide so will have to wait and see.
MSN will have to answer these questions and more if it is to wrestle control of the UK PPC market from Google and Yahoo! and MIVA, its going to be an interesting summer for search marketers.
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
Dollar Downloads and Musical Mischief
Today’s news is that Apple has resigned contracts with the major music labels – Universal, Warner Music, EMI and Sony BMG – to sell their songs online at a fixed price of 79p in the UK and 99 cents in the US.
The BBC spins this as Apple ‘winning’ and focuses on the fact that the music companies have been fighting for months to try and charge higher prices for new releases.
I think there are a couple of bigger issues here.
Firstly, have the music labels not faced enough erosion into their profits to understand that the days of charging £20 for an album are gone? People no longer see such high prices as acceptable in the digital age and rather than charging the consumer more money for songs in a different format, shouldn’t the record labels be looking for a new model that will sustain their position for the future?
Secondly, why does the UK pay more for downloads than the US? A flat price at the US level would see the UK paying about 55p per download, not 79p. This is nothing more than protecting profits in the market and with the popularity of iTunes that is basically price fixing.
In the US the attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, has launched a wide-ranging investigation into allegations that record labels are fixing the prices of music downloads. In Europe Microsoft has faced numerous anti-trust cases from the EU over its dominance.
How long will it be before we see the EU take a stand over the same issues with Apple and the record labels? And what will that mean for the future of record companies?
Will future number 1s come exclusively from the likes of the Arctic Monkeys and Gnarls Barkley (and their record labels) who have worked out how to use the potential of online for generating interest and sales, rather than ripping off consumers over price?
The BBC spins this as Apple ‘winning’ and focuses on the fact that the music companies have been fighting for months to try and charge higher prices for new releases.
I think there are a couple of bigger issues here.
Firstly, have the music labels not faced enough erosion into their profits to understand that the days of charging £20 for an album are gone? People no longer see such high prices as acceptable in the digital age and rather than charging the consumer more money for songs in a different format, shouldn’t the record labels be looking for a new model that will sustain their position for the future?
Secondly, why does the UK pay more for downloads than the US? A flat price at the US level would see the UK paying about 55p per download, not 79p. This is nothing more than protecting profits in the market and with the popularity of iTunes that is basically price fixing.
In the US the attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, has launched a wide-ranging investigation into allegations that record labels are fixing the prices of music downloads. In Europe Microsoft has faced numerous anti-trust cases from the EU over its dominance.
How long will it be before we see the EU take a stand over the same issues with Apple and the record labels? And what will that mean for the future of record companies?
Will future number 1s come exclusively from the likes of the Arctic Monkeys and Gnarls Barkley (and their record labels) who have worked out how to use the potential of online for generating interest and sales, rather than ripping off consumers over price?
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