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A few weeks ago, I was struck with inspiration. I was graciously invited to tag along with the Centro Marketing team to the Prince concert in Chicago. Midway through the show, Prince requested everyone to get out their phones to illuminate the arena.

Phones have become the new lighters at concerts. Thousands of small illuminated screens dotted the arena. And while I, along with the marketing team, followed suit with our own phones, I couldn’t help but see thousands of small illuminated advertising opportunities. I laughed and mentioned that this was a blog post waiting to be written.

But it’s true, there is an opportunity here.

The option to geo-target mobile phones based on zip-code, location or radius is becoming fairly mainstream; what an opportunity to have nearly 20,000 like-minded people in one place!

This opportunity can translate from concerts to sporting events, conferences or festivals. The point is, there is an opportunity for event targeting. Whether it is in a cab going to or from an event, or in bars and restaurants surrounding the location, the ability to target around events is present.

Coupling mobile with several digital OOH opportunities provides smart targeting and something a little outside the box compared to display.

Would you ever consider targeting events to reach your audience?

It’s a lingering question on the tips of tongues of many media professionals: What’s the true worth of mobile media?

And it’s a question that’s commonly followed by a slew of others: Does the medium’s true worth have yet to come? When it arrives, what will that worth represent to advertisers in the scheme of a larger media mix? And what distinctive role can mobile be relied upon to play?

As things stand now, the mobile world is no stranger to skeptics questioning the space’s ability to deliver measurable ROI as effectively as traditional offline channels, like TV and print, or the mainstream digital medium of desktop display. Mobile remains a space with believers and non-believers – those who see the development of valuable monetization models and those who question if or when it ever will.

While many advertisers can appreciate the rampant uptick in recent mobile consumption, hesitation still exists when budgeting spend for mobile.

An Ad Age article titled, “Will Mobile’s Massive Growth Equal Real Revenue” puts new perspective on the issue. The piece highlights the growth in mobile consumption that drove a rush to monetize the medium and the consequential undervaluation of inventory. Industry professionals agree that an incredible volatility still exists with the pricing of mobile CPMs, a concerning reality for publishers and content distributors.

There’s also the issue of the medium needing to take better advantage of the mobile device’s functionality with more dynamic executions and user-friendly creative. Mobile rich media is becoming a highly touted offering due to its ability to fulfill this void in mobile executions.

It’s fair to say that mobile is still in its infancy, and time is needed to standardize means of user engagement, user expectations and offering costs.

Read the article in Ad Age, Will Mobile’s Massive Growth Ever Equal Real Revenue? and share your thoughts. What do you think it will take for mobile media to reach its monetization potential and where do you think things stand now?

Demographic groupings no longer clearly capture the essence of consumers – nor do they define how or what a consumer will do in their daily lives.

Madison Avenue is getting a wake-up call as NBC News Digital decides to nix demographics and replace them with articulated personas based on content interest and deep insight into how consumers digest news.

By shifting the focus to behavior, advertisers and publishers will be able to operate more in sync around consumer interests and content preferences – hopefully proving more fruitful to all parties.

Read more about NBC’s move to targeting news consumer “archetypes”.

(CIMA, Written by Brandi Lipton) - CIMA hosted an Entrepreneurial Luncheon Panel last week. To say the luncheon was inspiring would be an understatement.  Kevin Willer, President and CEO of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center, moderated a panel of three dynamic Chicagoland entrepreneurs: Shawn Riegsecker, Founder of Centro; Matt Spiegel, CEO of Tap.me; and Genevieve Thiers, Founder of SitterCity.com, who all shared advice, and stories of their successes, challenges and experiences along their road to success.

Shawn Riegsecker shared how he had mapped out a plan for his life, which included starting his own business by the age of 30.  Shawn had started his career working for the yellow pages, was involved in the launch of Ohio’s first website, Cleveland.com, and following, worked at 24/7 Media, helping advertisers to buy local ads.  He noticed that the system was not working efficiently, and started developing software to make it easier for advertisers to scale their buying of local ads. This initial idea resulted in Shawn’s establishing Centro as a company in 2001 at the age of 29.  The company has now grown to include 30 offices nationwide and close to 300 employees.

In the beginning stages, while Shawn was building the business, he did not have a mentor, but was inspired by reading of others’ success stories.  He recommended Richard Branson’s book, Losing My Virginity: How I Survived, Had Fun, and Made a Fortune Doing Business My Way.  Other words of wisdom from Shawn were that, “Luck =Preparedness + Opportunity + Courage”.  Besides running Centro as CEO, Shawn stays involved in the Chicago entrepreneurial community as a member of 1871 and as an angel investor in the FireStarter Fund.

(The Agency Post) – Winning hallmark accounts has long been a documented challenge for regional agencies, but a seismic shift is occurring. These agencies are becoming increasingly more valuable alongside their larger counterparts. While the media focus remains on behemoth agencies in major markets, the migration of talent, evolution of media and integration of platforms has leveled the playing field, arming regional agencies with the creativity and resources to make big brands think twice about whether Madison Avenue or Madison, Wis., representation is best.

The industry is experiencing a groundswell, and small to mid-sized regional agencies are invited to pitch and win national business from some of America’s most iconic brands. For instance, Hewlett Packard works with Burns Marketing based in Johnstown, Colorado, and George Killian’s Irish Red is represented by Jacobson/Rost, a Milwaukee-based agency.

Acquiring national business is just one step of the process. The path ahead holds excitement for agencies, but they must take the necessary actions to properly prepare account teams and, above all else, stay true to the promises made to the newly acquired client.

Bandwidth is holding regional agencies back.

Read the remainder of this article on The Agency Post.

When you think about the importance of YouTube to the music industry, the one thing you can’t say is that nobody saw it coming… well, at least they anticipated the majority of it.

That being said, a couple of interesting reports and articles have been circulating over the past couple of weeks related to the impact YouTube and Social media are having on an industry that historically has been controlled by the major record labels.

A recent survey by Nielsen found that nearly two thirds of 3,000 teenagers polled identified YouTube as their favorite source for listening to music over both the radio and CDs.  This has led to an entirely new way of music discovery that is much more personal, and devoid of Tabitha Soren and the programming rotations that forced MC Hammer down my throat for the better parts of 7th and 8th grade.

A great example of this discovery comes in the form of Carly Rae Jepson.  The New York Times had a killer article that provides some great perspective of how YouTube and Twitter impacted the growth and popularity of ‘Call Me Maybe’ to the point of 262,000,000 views over the course of 6 months.

As if that weren’t enough, the phenomenon spawned another 200+ million views through knock-offs by Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, the US Olympic Swim Team – as well as a dusting off of Tay Zonday.

And while Carly Rae Jepson’s time in the sun is starting to become her time in the dusk, the behaviors that brought her to the forefront are just now being recognized for their power.  I’m a little nervous about what next summer may bring…

A newly released report by global consumer researcher Ericsson ConsumerLab, “Getting Social: TV not just for watching” finds new evidence supporting the rapid evolution of media consumption through simultaneous and paired usage of media channels.

The study made several observations involving the development of social viewing behaviors that have been popularized largely by the ubiquity of emerging technology platforms like smartphones and tablets.

While TV notably remains a prevailing means of content consumption, other media channels play a critical and growing role in enriching the user experience. Core findings include the likelihood of viewers to use social media while viewing video content or TV programming. The study found that 62% of TV viewers use social media on a weekly basis, an 18% increase from 2011. Additionally, 67% of those same TV viewers use a tablet, smartphone or laptop while viewing television.

Other findings included the reasons behind the increasingly social nature of television. The study provided a list of key drivers leading to social TV behavior that include people no longer watching TV alone, users seeking to gain a sense of community, a curiosity for the opinion of others, and wanting to influence and interact with others and influence content.

In this fast evolution of media habits, mobile devices and tablets are playing a bigger role both on their own and paired with traditional media. Regardless of their affinity for the digital space or emerging media, brands must closely examine the way in which their digital advertising plans reflect these actively shifting consumption patterns.

Check out the Ericsson Consumer Lab research study.