Well, it’s finally here.  Are you planning to pick one up?  With today’s announcement of the iPhone 5, millions of consumers will shortly be gearing up to wait in enormous lines and pick up the latest piece of consumer technology.  However, this one could be a big deal.  Some analysts are predicting the potential of Apple moving 10MM devices by the end of September.  Additionally, the market is prime for a new iPhone.  50% of the US market still doesn’t own a smartphone and this is the first major redesign for the iPhone since June 2010 (iPhone 4).

Without a doubt, adoption of the iPhone 5 will drive increased penetration of smartphones, which is good news for mobile marketers.  This will create more data, impressions and scale for advertisers looking to use mobile as an advertising vehicle.  Product launches like the one today only help to speed up the massive changes in consumer behavior and media consumption that are occurring.

However, many marketers are still unsure of why they should be adding mobile to the advertising mix.  Many of these marketers, some of whom will probably wait in line for the iPhone 5, aren’t educated on the landscape, what budgets they should allocate to the space or why multi-screen viewing is so important to understand. Fortunately, there have been some great studies released over the past month (see below) that help explain why mobile advertising isn’t a trend, but rather a vital part of the marketing mix.  So, as the late Steve Jobs might say, there is just one more thing(okay, three).  Below are three timely resources that can help marketers understand why mobile advertising is so important.

1. Recommended Mobile Budget Allocation (MMA Study)
2. Guide to Mobile Marketing / Mobile Fact Pack (AdAge)
3. Navigating the New Multi-Screen World (Google)

I recently read a great article on Digiday called The Ad Network Transparency Conspiracy that resonated with me – I felt it aligned perfectly with some industry challenges Centro has aimed to address.

If you ask any media planner or buyer to think back to when they studied media planning and were asked to create a “dream campaign,” they’d probably tell you that they hadn’t yet gained understanding of the challenges execution poses in reality. And I seriously doubt that anyone would have relied on networks to account for much of their plan.

Why? Because they were thinking without boundaries or limitations. They were thinking solely about relevant content, top tier sites, and custom executions. In other words: They were thinking only about the best interests of the brand they were planning for. But in the real world, there are challenges to building “dream” campaigns.

For instance, content sites lead in the arenas of purchase intent, brand favorability, quality perception, message association, aided brand awareness and a slew of other metrics – and by wide margins. But agencies quickly learn that actually executing that dream plan is too often out of their scope of reality because of just how complex the logistics get.

This challenge makes the network solution very attractive, allowing a planner to show some of the top tier sites on a network, tout that they’ve gotten the brand on some of the most desirable publishers on the web, and breathe of sigh of relief that they can actually execute it within their already overstretched bandwidth.

Equally important: The buyer can boast they got all this for their client for a very attractive eCPM.

Yet – as the author of the Digiday article pointed out – if the vast majority of your impressions are landing on lower-quality long tail sites and only a small portion is being purchased on premium sites, this “iceberg” method of delivery is massively misleading to the agency or brand. When taken into consideration, the CPM can actually be much less efficient dollar for dollar.

But what good is it to point out the broken methods in our industry without offering up a solution? Well, Centro has one: Go ahead, think up dream campaigns.

Every time you’re asked to create a media plan, create something you would’ve been proud of as a student studying advertising. Create something without any regard for “How will we actually do this?” Don’t cut corners on the strategy. Don’t fall into the trap of going for efficiency on the front end because it’s the easiest to sell up the ladder.

Create efficiencies where the real inefficiencies lie: In the logistics of the implementation and execution of a complex and well-thought-out media plan. Do it by partnering with a platform designed specifically to address those roadblocks so you can dedicate your talents to creating media plans without boundaries.

(Part III) Adding third-party digital media logistics experts to a service provider adds another layer to the evolution of the industry. According to Craig Montgomery, principal of marketing strategy firm CMG partners, “It can be done, but it will take time and there will be some carnage along the way.”

Montgomery contends that adding outside support staff can and will happen if the process can be codified and commoditized. The first step is for a company to realize that digital media logistics is not its core competency and that service providers can do it better, for less.

“In reality, I think it will evolve much like other services,” he adds. “Some companies do media planning internally to maintain control; others hand it over it to an agency.  Some agencies outsource media planning.  It is actually no different than any other business decision for outsourcing.”

Montgomery notes that while there is an inherent risk in going outside your organization for anything, there is also a natural ebb and flow between centralization and fragmentation of services and products. “We are moving to the next stage of that process for digital media logistics,” he says. “In the beginning there was the full-service agency. Then there were digital and media planning agencies. If there is a market large enough to justify a specialization for outsourced services, then there will be somebody who will build that business to address that market.”

Agencies in particular are reluctant to surrender control of clients’ spending habits and strategy, especially when it involves branding. “The question,” Montgomery says, “is whether or not digital media logistics is the key.  I would venture to say perhaps no. Recently at a conference in London, Kevin Roberts, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi Worldwide, stated that strategy is dead, the big idea is dead, management is dead and marketing, as we know, is also dead. Digital is part of marketing.

“The question an agency should ask is, does controlling digital media logistics solve the problem? The answer is no.  While I don’t think marketing is dead, I do think it needs to get back to its core principles. For agencies, this means that owning media logistics is not the answer. Insights and knowledge of how media impacts customers is the answer.”

Montgomery agrees that media logistics must be combined with campaign planning and buying, and connecting the brand with the publishers.  For this, partnering with an outsource provider makes more sense than the agency trying to do it in-house.

“As for the client,” he says. “It’s simple.  If it’s cheaper and provides parity in control with little proven risk over time to the brand or business – it wins.”

• Is mobile an essential part of your marketing mix? A new MMA (Mobile Marketing Association) study concludes that the optimized level of spend on mobile advertising for U.S. marketers in 2012 should be 7% (on avg.) vs. the current budget allocation of less than 1%. Findings also reveal over the next 4 years, mobile’s share will increase to at least 10% (on avg.) based on increased adoption of smartphones alone. Consumers are rapidly adopting mobile…shouldn’t marketers too? Read More: MMA Launches Mobile Study “MXS”
• According to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, OOH advertising revenue rose 4.3% in the second quarter of 2012 compared to the same period in 2011, accounting for more than $2 billion. Revenue for the first half of 2012 has reached nearly $3.5 billion. Revenue estimates include billboard, street furniture, transit, alternative, and cinema advertising, as well as digital platforms for advertising spending. Top segments include: auto dealers, retail and insurance and real estate, and governments, politics, and organizations. Read More: Out of Home Advertising Second Quarter Revenue Up 4.3%

Even as we rush headlong towards 2013, the speed-of-light changes in our industry demand we all become visionaries, able to look past what I like to call “The Great Disruption” – the immediate and ever-evolving commotion in the media landscape – to the horizon: 2017.

That’s exactly what I’ll be talking about when representatives from 2,000 local newspapers and their digital products gather in Atlanta from September 11th to the 14th for the 2012 Local Media Fall Publishers’ & Advertising Directors’ Conference.

Sure, we all instinctively know that the next 5 years will cause the greatest disruption yet – far more than anything we have seen date. But the question on everyone’s mind – the one I’ll answer during my presentation is: What will things look like when the dust settles?

For starters, the tablet, which is already proving to be powerfully disruptive, will unveil its full range of tremendous opportunities. In fact, the one thing you can count on in 2017 is that all media will be changed in unimaginable ways – some will simply go away and others will transform into entities that are nearly unimaginable today.

During my session, you’ll get exclusive insight into my vision for the 2017 media landscape, including how I foresee media consolidating in the wake of the fragmentation process, how companies will have to adjust their cost structures, and how “the cloud” will become a day-to-day reality in all aspects of our work and play. I’m already using these upcoming realities to prepare Centro for the massive changes ahead and you probably hope to do the same. Join me.

(Part II) The digital media industry has changed dramatically in the past few years. Craig Montgomery, principal at CMG Partners, a marketing strategy firm, thinks that changes in the mobile and social world represent the most fascinating aspects of the industry’s evolution.

“Tablets and 4G phones are transforming how and when we consume media,” he says. “Most homes have multiple devices, and use them in tandem. Many of us have our laptops or phones nearby when watching television. Imagine the possibilities to truly align these channels and drive better synergies between digital media and traditional media.”

Television is fast evolving from being a traditional vehicle of “made-for-TV” content into a vehicle for online content and media as well. “The reverse is happening too – online media is being shaped in part by television content, which helps create new online advertising platform. The genie is out of the bottle and soon we will no longer be talking about television and online media as separate things. They are on a collision course.”

In terms of digital media’s future, Montgomery thinks about how that future looks from the point of view of CMG’s clients, who are marketing leaders. “Online media is still just emerging, if you can imagine that. We tend to think that the Internet is maturing, but it is still in its infancy compared to television. There is a bright and exciting future ahead of digital media and the online world – we will see the industry take risks and transform. There will be some incredible success stories and even more sensational failures.”

Best of all, Montgomery says, we may see the emergence of the next medium that will eventually replace digital.  “If the past is a good forecast of the future, the digital world may see its successor in about 15 years or so. How exciting.”

(Part I) CMG Partners is a marketing strategy firm specializing in both digital and traditional media. Principal Craig Montgomery focuses on consulting, strategy and business development activities for his clients. While CMG does not partake in digital media logistics on a grand scale for its own operations, the firm helps clients with their digital media logistics.

Montgomery has recently noticed what he calls an “interesting and fluid dynamic” between online and traditional media. “As Newton once said, ‘For each action there is an equal and opposite reaction,’” he notes.

“It was not long ago that we saw massive surges in online spending. This was due, in part at least, to the expansion of online channels and the ability to measure online spending much more effectively than television spending.  Over time, the television media industry has become more attuned to this and in turn has done a better job broadening its revenue base.

“To put it another way, the television media industry is not going to just lie down and surrender easily – at least not yet,” Montgomery says. “It has outdone far too many challengers up to this point.  Television will continue to find new and interesting ways to capture media dollars in the short term. This may also lead to a blurring of the two mediums in terms of how dollars are spent and implemented. This is where the turn of power will occur.”

Montgomery notes that online media growth is partially fueled by the content from television, which spurs new online advertising platforms. This means the cost of creating that content can be spread over two mediums versus one, and shared with more people via different vehicles.

“The problem only arises if your online advertising revenue is less per viewer than television, and you are just trading viewers from one channel to the other,” he says. “That is the definition of a slow death.”

While some would argue that it is only a matter of time before online overshadows television, Montgomery says, “Internet advertising has surpassed cable television in ad revenue. Some say Nielsen data indicates that in few years it will eclipse all television ad revenue. Place your bets.”