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Viacom 18 Forays Into App Ecosystem With Three Mobile Products

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Fri, 24 May 2013 08:11:48 +0000

Viamcom 18 has launched three new products under three of its most popular brands – MTV, VH1 and Nick. They are MTV Gupshup – a VAS chat service, Vh1 Hub- mobile content shop and mobile game Stardom Saga.

Rajneel Kumar, Viacom18’s VP and Business Head, Digital Media said “The initiative is in tune with the fact that youth is spending more time on phones than TV. We want to capture this growing number of audience. Our first product MTV GupShup targets youth while Vh1 Hub is a platform which is best for international music discovery. They do not have to depend on operator anymore to download their favourite tracks. Stardom Saga is aimed at attracting young girls to live a fantasy life of a star via the game.”

MTV Gupshup:

The company has partnered with chat service platform Altruist to which allows to make friends in India. Available in 13 different languages MTV Gupshup enable searches through various options like friendship, flirting and serious relationship. Viacom 18 is targeting the expanding VAS ecosystem of the country with this IVR based chat service.

Vh1 Hub:

A mobile content shop powered by Techzone, VH1 Hub boasts of international music. It enables users to download mobile content like songs, ringtones, caller back tunes, videos and wallpapers by logging on to the Vh1 Hub WAP/mobile site or website. The Vh1 Hub is available on Android, Blackberry and Symbian. Customers will be charged by the operators for using MTV GupShup and VH1 hub service. I checked out the website which has a good collection of old and latest international music. Users can check out a sample track and buy them but not listen to the whole song. No information about the pricing is given on the website. Vh1 recently collaborated with Hungama to launch music streaming app Vh1 Pulse on Facebook.

Stardom Saga:

Aimed at teenage girls and Available on iOS and Android, the the objective of the game is to become a celebrity star and the girls will be given virtual currency to manage. They can dress up their avatars at the salon and boutique, hire an agent to represent them, audition for movie roles and earn some quick coins from commercials. The content for the game has been created based on the understanding of the consumer behavior.

For now Viacom is promoting all these products through TVCs on its network channels, and advertisements on social networks and its existing mobile network.

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Google+ Android App Updates With Photo Enhancement And Improved Location Sharing

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 21 May 2013 08:34:33 +0000

Soon after adding whopping 41 features for Google+ last week during I/O, Google has now updated its Google+ android app.  The latest update focuses on images, location and the overall stream. Like the Web version,  Google+ for Android provides users with options such as automatic photo enhancements and Auto Awesome.

Google+ will automatically show you “highlights” of each photo gallery which saves your time of digging through large galleries. It will also allow you to preview or undo automatic photo enhancements. The Auto-awesome tool lets you create animations or panoramas from still shots.

“Photos, location and the stream are only some of the things we’ve improved in today’s update. Notifications are nicer to look at and easier to use. You can edit additional profile fields on the go. And there’s one-tap access to the all new Hangouts app — just to name a few”, wrote Bradley Horowitz, Vice President of Product, Google+ the company blog post.

Photo Editing

Auto-backup is added in the update to automatically backup user’s photos taken on their phone to the cloud. Google acquired photo-editing service Snapseed late last year and quickly implemented its features into the Google+ desktop app. Now Android users can enjoy these features on their mobile devices. Those features include better photo cropping, rotating and exposure adjustments, as well as new filters to choose from. A selection of filters including Drama and Retrolux can also be accessed from with in the app.

Location Sharing

Location sharing is also a bit smarter in Google+ 4.0. By tapping “Locations” from Google+ app menu, the new Locations section lets users see where their friends are via a map. Automatic hashtags, added to Google+ on the web last week, makes its way to Android in this latest update too.

In the stream, the Google+ app has also been tweaked to include the new automated hashtags found on the desktop version. Those browsing their activity stream will be able to see the hashtags in the upper right hand corner of posts. These hashtags are automatically added by Google. These Google-added tags will appear at the top-right of individual posts and tapping on them will reveal streams of relevant content. Users can also choose to manually add hashtags.

All the above updates are Google’s effort to ramp up user engagement on Google+ which is currently world’s second biggest social network. However, these updates are only available for devices running Android 4.0 or later. I believe these updates will land on iOS soon.

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Pinterest Teams Up With Brands

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Mon, 20 May 2013 08:40:10 +0000

In a bid to attract potential advertisers, Pinterest has introduced two new features. First up is ‘Pins with useful information‘ and second is a ‘Pin It‘ button that is now available on some mobile apps. The popular social scrapbooking site has integrated images with associated brands thereby making it easier to click through links and purchase them directly. This move will not only benefit users but also make the site potentially more attractive to advertising partners.

“From your feed, you can tell when a pin has more information by the icon that appears below the picture,” the company explains on its blog. Pinterest is launching three distinct types of pins, with one type each for food, retail products, and movies. It has partnered with several brands, including eBay, Target, ModCloth, Sony and Netflix, to introduce these informative pins. The content of these pins will vary based on the brands who post them.

Moreover, in order to expand its mobile presence, Pinterest has also  rolling out another new feature that gives users the option to pin from mobile apps. This will make make sharing content to the site more seamless. Currently only a handful of apps will get the pin it button.

When I tried to check out these feature I was unable to find them. Pinterest said that the pins are available only in the revamped site which rolled out in March. The company said to get the new look by clicking the ‘Get it now’ button on top of your home feed. But I did not find it either. It seems the rollout is still in the pipeline for India.

Anyways, Pinterest has been pretty active lately. Last week it rolled out updates for its iOS and Android apps. It then added a feature that lets users send pins to their friends. In March Pinterest added data analytic tool for businesses. Last year in November, the three year old start-up launched free business accounts for marketers thereby sending signals to the multitude of brands and retailers already active on its platform that it’s getting ready to open for business. Also a survey in October 2012 revealed that Pinterest is driving more e-commerce sales than Facebook

I believe the new feature will increase engagement on the site and also help users track their favorite item on the site. This will only help the company if in future it plans to take the e-commerce route.

Image Courtesy | mediaemerging

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YouTube Turns Eight; Users Now Upload Over 100 Hours Video Per Minute

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Mon, 20 May 2013 07:25:26 +0000

It is now 8 years since Youtube came online. YouTube users are now uploading 100 hours worth of video to the content viewing platform every single minute, according to the company blog post.

YouTube now claims four days worth of video uploaded every minute and 144 billion minutes of playable video uploaded every single day. Back in 2011, YouTube users were adding 48 hours of video per minute, while that figure jumped to 72 hours per week last year.

2013 has already been a year of milestones for YouTube. Google announced in March that the site now has over one billion unique visitors a month, and this month YouTube announced a pilot program for paid channel subscriptions and also revealed it would allow channels with over 1,000 subscribers to add live streaming features.

“We’d like to thank you for making YouTube the special place that it is. For showing us how video can create connection, transcend borders, and make a difference”, concluded the YouTube post.

Google acquired YouTube in October 2006 for $1.65 billion. With YouTube attracting such a massive amount of content and users, I believe we might see YouTube integration with other Google platforms. India has seen a huge increase in total online video consumption since past two years. As per the latest report from comScore, India has watched 3.7 billion videos per month on their personal computers. These numbers are only going to shoot up further with increasing use of smartphones and internet.

Image Courtesy | youtube

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Online Video Consumption On Desktops In India Reaches 3.7 Billion Per Month

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 07 May 2013 11:21:09 +0000

India has seen a huge increase in total online video consumption since past two years. As per the latest report from comScore, India has watched 3.7 billion videos per month on their personal computers.  This dramatic growth has been driven by a sizable increase in the number of online video viewers, in addition to increasing consumption per viewer. The total online video audience in India has grown 74 percent to 54 million viewers, with the average viewer watching 18 percent more videos and spending 28 percent more time viewing.

Giving insights about the same Kedar Gavane, Senior Director, comScore India said, “The rapid online video growth we’re witnessing in India represents a significant opportunity for both marketers and media companies in India. As the Indian online video market begins to realize the value of its existing inventory while continuing its growth in viewers and consumption time, there will be substantial upside for the key players in this market.”

The research firm reveals that the actual number of videos being watched per month has doubled from 1.8 billion in 2011, to 3.7 billion last month. On an average each viewer is spending 431 minutes in a month on watching online videos as of March 2013 compared to 337.8 minutes in March 2011, added the report.

As expected Google and You Tube topped the charts with maximum number of users (31.5 million), the number of videos consumed (2 billion), and average user session (258 minutes). Facebook came in second with 18, 606 unique users, 1, 50, 565 videos. Other video platforms which made the list were Yahoo Sites, VDOPIA.com and Dailymotion.com.

comScore only tracks Internet visits from work and home PCs, which means no data from mobile devices is included in this report. Considering the mobile and internet explosion in country these numbers will be easily overtaken. Videos have become an important part of the internet ecosystem. We have seen launch of new video apps and VCs investing in video startups recently.

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Bharti SoftBank Teams Up With Nokia To Expand Hike Messenger’s User Base

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Mon, 06 May 2013 10:15:12 +0000

In a bid to further expand its user base, Bharti Soft Bank (BSB) has joined hands with Nokia to pre-load its instant messaging application ‘Hike’ on its smartphones. As per the agreement Nokia will preload Hike on Lumia 510, Lumia 720 and all Nokia Asha Full Touch phones sold in India.

Speaking about the integration, BSB’s Head of Product and Strategy Kavin Bharti Mittal said, “We are very excited to partner with a leading brand like Nokia in the Indian market. For us at BSB, ecosystem partnerships are a critical part of our overall business strategy”.

A 50-50 partnership between India’s Bharti Telecom and Japan’s Softbank telecom provide, BSB recently invested $7 million in Hike. The instant messaging platform offers seamless integration between instant messaging and standard text messaging (SMS). It recently crossed 5 million users and is gradually becoming popular among feature phone users. According to the company about 60% of hike’s user base comes from India and the rest global led by Middle East and Europe.

Last month, Nokia introduced latest Asha 201 with dedicated Whats App button and last year in December Nokia launched Asha 205 with Facebook button. Although the recent partnership with BSB does not put a dedicated hike button on Nokia devices, a pre loaded app will help the former to expand its user based and later to boost its sale.

Mobile instant messaging recently surpassed the SMS and I believe the number will manifold even further in near future with such initiatives.

Website | Hike

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iDubba Launches Social TV App ‘iCouch’ For Android

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Thu, 02 May 2013 05:25:53 +0000

iDubba, a TV programme recommendation guide has teamed up with television channel ZCafe to launch a mobile app for Android users. Dubbed as ‘iCouch‘ the free app enables users to interact with each other in real time via an interactive chat room. The social TV app will showcase popular American Drama Series ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ on 1 May. The service lets you chat while the program is running and capture your favorite scenes. More new shows and programs will soon be added to the service.

iCouch has partnered with Zee Cafe for this and the channel will have a ticker running for the show. iCouch will enable users to read and like popular chats while watching the program. It will also throw up interesting facts and trivia about the show and at the same time will allow users to invite friends and send them alerts, play contests and win prizes. To start the app you have to add your mobile number and enter a password which is sent after adding your number. The app then integrates and pulls out friends automatically from your contact list.

Speaking about the app Rabi Gupta, Co Founder – iDubba, “iCouch is a chat forum that helps build and developing the discussion of your favourite show. iCouch is a platform that makes the current TV viewing scenario more charged up with entertainment, live gossips, snip-bits and chats”.

A Morpheus Gang company, iDubba had raised investment from Rajan Anandan, Seeders and Srikant Sastri last year. American sitcoms are quite popular among masses in India and I believe this partnership will give iDubba a good platform to reach to a larger audience. The company is also seeing some action on its Facebook and Twitter page. The company has promised to add more shows to the service and I hope they add more funny sitcoms and thriller series rather than long drama series.

You can download the app here.

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Mobile Instant Messaging Apps Outpace SMS: Informa Report

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:30:20 +0000

Yesterday, we reported that smartphones sales have surpassed that of feature phones. Now, it seems instant messaging apps have overtaken traditional SMS texting. According to a latest report form research firm Informa, six of the most popular mobile chat applications, including WhatsApp, BlackBerry Messenger, Viber, Nimbuzz, Apple’s iMessage, and KakaoTalk, averaged nearly 19 billion messages sent and received worldwide each day in 2012, compared with 17.6 billion SMS texts.

The shift away from SMS is probably going to have a big impact on the amount of revenue mobile carriers are able to generate. Pamela Clark-Dickson of Informa said some operators were already “seeing a decline in their messaging revenues“.  According to another study released by research firm Ovum, social-messaging apps will cost global mobile operators $32.6 billion of lost revenue in 2013, and that figure will jump to over $86 billion in 2020.

The “unlimited” nature of many of the messaging apps seems to be driving its growth, with 32.6 messages sent per day on average, compared with just five texts. Informa estimated that by 2014, the gap between chat applications and SMS messages will widen considerably, with 21 billion text messages seen daily, vs. nearly 50 billion app-based messages.

However, SMS isn’t dying out quite yet, because chat apps are only thriving on smartphones. Clark said that there are a large number of consumers, especially in emerging and lesser developed economies, who use normal mobile phones and rely on SMS as the preferred messaging tool. The report touts that there are 3.5 billion texters worldwide compared with 586 million using messaging services. It also said that SMS revenue is expected to grow to $127 billion by 2016 from $115bn last year.

Text messaging turned 20 in December last year  but is now in decline in a number of developed countries. Developing countries are also gradually shifting to instant messaging owing to affordable high end feature phones that come along with dedicated WhatsApp and Facebook button. I am personally an avid WhatsApp user and hardly use text as a medium. I have also seen people actually shift to a smartphone to enjoy these services. And I believe volume of instant messaging which is already immensely popular especially with the youth will only manifold in near future due to this shift. What do you think? Let us know with your comments.

Image Courtesy | e27.co

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Market For Mobile Health Sensors To Catapult To $5.6 Billion By 2017

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 07:07:53 +0000

As per a latest report from market research firm research2guidance, revenue generated with sensors connecting to an app will reach $5.6 billion by 2017. The firm believes that this segment of the market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 69 % and 61 million health sensors will ship in 2017.

Sighting further insights the report says that mHealth app based business models, which rely on sensors sales will play a major role in the mHealth market. mHealth apps are increasing the external sensors that can track a range of health metrics, such as blood pressure, heart rate, glucose level, medication compliance and more. These sensors then connect with the corresponding app via Bluetooth, WiFi or USB. Finally, the app analyzes, displays and shares the data that is being monitored by the sensors.

“The majority of sensors will track health parameters for sports and fitness purposes just as the existing hundreds of ANT+ sensors today”, explained Ralf-Gordon Jahns, Head of Research at research2guidance. The company estimates that there are currently about 200 external health-related sensors that can connect to smartphones and most are priced between $20 and $200. It touts that today’s app-connecting sensors are more consumer products than medical products. “With the boom of the smartphone app market, sensors which link to an app became fashionable products. They have got nothing to do with the grey and clumsy sensors that really looked like medical devices and that you would hesitate to show in public. Today’s app-related sensors are very designed just like the corresponding apps”, Jahn added.

Research2guidance further reveals that the market today is dominated by smaller sensor companies that first launched in 2009 or 2010, but larger sports and technology companies like Nike and Samsung are now taking serious efforts to enhance their health-related offerings. The firm also believes that health sensor companies will increasingly shift their business models from proprietary data silos to sensors that feed into multiple apps from third parties. The report concludes saying that smaller tech companies with less financial muscle will have to strive hard in order to catapult their user base. The mHealth market will become tough and they have to keep track with the innovation speed in the smartphone/app/sensor market.

Earlier in March, research2guidance estimated that over by 2017 3.4 billion people will have smartphones or tablets with access to mobile health apps and 50 percent of them will have downloaded health apps.

The mobile healthcare market has evolved remarkably in recent years mainly due to advent of smartphones and tablets. A recent Cisco study reveals that Indians are open to virtual healthcare. The Indian healthcare space has also seen traction lately. Major companies are coming together to push mHealth in the country. Moreover, the sector has seen a descent funding transactions in past few months.

I believe that healthcare is one of the best sectors in which technology and gadgets can play a definite role. I hope to see more and more developing countries apply these models.

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TimesJobs.com Releases Its Third Recruitex Report; Retail And BFSI Take Lead In Hiring

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 10:25:29 +0000

TimesJobs.com has released its third bi-annual edition of their comprehensive hiring report called ‘Recruitex’. The report gives information on the demand and supply of jobs in various sectors and the recruitment trends in India. As per the report, uncertainty in the global and domestic markets and policy fissures are resulting in slowdown in hiring. The report suggests that Automobile, Manufacturing and BFSI industry will continue its positive hiring momentum in 2013.

Here are the key findings of the report:

Industry Trends:

Cautious optimism ruled the recruitment industry during the July-December 2012 period

Automobile industry continued on the growth path and reported significant increase in hiring activity

The future of BFSI sector in 2013 is expected to be challenging yet full of opportunities, with lakhs of new jobs expected in the industry as lots of foreign banks are entering Indian markets.

FMCG is expected to generate 1.76 lakh new jobs in 2013. Hiring is likely to go up by 10-15%in the months of April May ’13

Infrastructure industry also saw hiring optimism in 2013 as this year will witness the impact of the economic reforms

The Indian Retail sector is pegged to create 10 million jobs by 2015 due. 2013 will be different due to the government relaxing investment norms and allowing 51%FDI in multi-brand retail and 100% FDI in single brand retail recently.

Healthcare sector witnessed disappointing performance in 2012 owing to global economic pattern change

Hiring through Tier II and III cities will become more and more evident in 2013, thereby giving visibility to rural talent.

IT-Telecom sector fell from July to December 2012 in most major locations and will continue in 2013. The telecom industry faced a lot of uncertainty in 2012 and that led to slow hiring in 2012

Location wise hiring:

Mumbai captured the maximum share (29%) of the total jobs created in BFSI industry during the July December ’12 period

Bengaluru lead the IT/Telecom industry with 34%

Among top locations, Kerala was the only region to clock growth (9%)in demand for talent. Pune was worst effected among top job locations, witnessing a drop of 33%in demand

Delhi/NCR and Bengaluru experienced a significant drop of 26% in overall demand of talent for Retail

In Automobile sector Delhi NCR witnessed the maximum (25%) share of the total jobs generate

Mumbai saw 4% growth in Healthcare sector while Bengaluru witnessed 31% drop in hiring

Social Media hiring emerged in 2012 as employers moved towards online social and professional networks to not only look for talent but also to build their employer brand among passive candidates. During the July-December 2012 period, demand for fresh/entry level candidates and senior professionals was upbeat in some industries. Sharing further insights on same Amit Jain, Business Head, TimesJobs.com, said, “While support functions saw growth in hiring activity; Sales and Business Development professionals emerged as the most in-demand profile early this year. Most organisations across industries are focused on manpower optimization – ‘hiring on demand’ rather than benching. Going forward, policy decisions will spur hiring, particularly in the BFSI and Retail Sectors.”

The report concluded saying that the collaboration between government, academia and industries is the need of the hour and it would provide a competitive edge to Indian recruitment industry in 2013.

All the information above (including data and images) are from the TimesJobs Recruitex report.

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Twitter Strikes Its Biggest Ad Deal Yet With Starcom MediaVest Group

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 07:02:57 +0000

Twitter has nailed its biggest advertising deal yet with one of the world’s leading ad-buyers Publicis’s Starcom MediaVest Group (SMG). The financial details of the deal were not disclosed.

The deal with SMG is worth hundreds of millions of dollars over several years and reflects both the growing importance of Twitter in media and marketing, and new thinking on its relationship with television. This also means that the company is officially expanding its territory when it comes to advertising and turning the social media company into a serious platform for brands. The report says the deal will give SMG’s clients access to special advertising slots and opportunities with Twitter.

Speaking about the partnership, Laura Desmond, global chief executive of Starcom,” Twitter, in a very short period of time, has gone from an experiment to something that is essential,” Laura Desmond, global chief executive of Starcom MediaVest Group, told the Financial Times.
“This signals to the marketplace how we want to conduct business and measure the implications. This is the future. It’s convergence.”

Twitter will leverage both to provide research and insight on how consumers are using the social network and how that engagement with TV and Twitter generates insight to marketing to consumers across the marketing ecosystem. Twitter also will provide custom research to SMG for the agency to give its clients for best practices about how to integrate Twitter and TV strategy. Brands have been looking for new ways to get involved with new technology in a means to increase the number of eyes looking at their commercials and advertisements. Twitter more than any other digital entity has built a connection to TV, with many brands adopting the #hastag as a promotional tool in their television ads. This puts Twitter in a very strong position to grab more brand digital ad revenue.

“The deal is about research and experiences on behalf of SMG’s clients.We think agencies play a big role bringing interesting new ideas to the platform and we want to support that. We want to create a great framework to measure”, said Adam Bain, president of global revenue at Twitter. Twitter has been unveiling new products such as keyword ad targeting as well as Twitter #Music recently. That seems to indicate the company is focusing on monetization. It even released API for brands in February.Twitter is also in negotiations with TV networks to bring more video content and advertising to the service. Twitter also bought social TV analytics firm Bluefin Labs in February, and has a data partnership with Nielsen.

The report further states that Twitter and SMG plan to create a “social TV lab” to better understand how marketers can use social media for ad campaigns that influence what people watch on TV. The partnership comes after a study by Nielsen confirms a strong rise in people watching television and using tablets and smartphones to access social media sites at the same time. Data showed an increase in Twitter volume and TV ratings. I believe this partnership does makes sense, after all, we do watch Chris Gayle hitting huge sixes and we do tweet about it.

EMarketer in late March estimated that Twitter’s total ad revenue will more than double year-over-year to $582.8 million in 2013 and is on track to hit $950 million in 2014. With this deal I feel Twitter will hit the estimated ad revenue.

Image Courtesy | telegraph.co.uk

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Amazon’s Android App Store To Expand To 200 Countries Along With India

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 09:56:14 +0000

Continuing the global expansion of its Appstore for Android, Amazon has announced to take its store available in 200 countries including India, Australia, Brazil, Canada, South Africa and Japan. The upcoming international expansion follows the launch of Amazon’s Appstore for Android in the U.K., Germany, France, Italy, and Spain.

Amazon says that the app store will be rolling out internationally in the coming months and users can pay with an Amazon account. The web giant has called on developers to submit their apps for distribution in the countries that are part of the newest rollout. The developers can submit their apps directly the Amazon Appstore and indicate whether or not they’re interested in global availability. “Allowing developers to target distribution of their apps and games in even more international countries is yet another important milestone as we strive to serve consumers and developers globally,” Mike George, vice president of apps and games at Amazon, said in a company statement.

The Amazon Appstore offers a paid app for free every day, and apps purchased from the store can be used across a customer’s Android devices, including Amazon’s line of Kindle Fire tablets. The company claims that features like 1-click purchasing, Amazon’s application programming interface (APIs) for in-app purchasing (IAP), A/B testing and GameCircle (the company’s gaming experience for Kindle Fire) are driving the success of the app store.

Amazon’s initiative to make its appstore available in India might be an indication of the launch range of its Kindle Fire Tablet in near future. Amazon has been in the tablet market for several years now but it has not yet released a smartphone. However some reports suggest that the company is also said to be planning to launch its smartphone soon. I feel if Amazon wants to become an alternative marketplace the global expansion of Appstore makes complete sense.

Image Courtesy | mail2web

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Publicis Groupe Buys SaaS Provider Neev, Launches Razorfish In India

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 12:46:13 +0000

In its initiative to reaffirm dominance in the digital space, Publicis Groupe , the French multinational advertising and public relations company has acquired Bengaluru-based technology services provider Neev as part of launching its digital entity Razorfish in India. The financial details of the deal were undisclosed. Started in 2005, Neev will be united with Razorfish, an interactive marketing and technology company and part of the Publicis Groupe, as a result of the acquisition. The agency will now operate as Razorfish Neev led by Neev CEO, Saurabh Chandra.

Founded by Saurabh Chandra and Santosh Shetty, Neev specializes in providing products in areas of video streaming, eCommerce, data visualization including patents in cloud and mobility. Speaking about the acquisition Saurabh Chandra, CEO, Neev said, “Neev has always delivered its work by leveraging leading edge technologies in cloud and mobility. With Razorfish we are looking at taking this to a larger portfolio of clients. Our focus remains delivering solutions to our clients that solve real business problems with the best combination of creativity and technology.”

The goal of Publicis is to double its size in India by 2015 and it has been acquiring a number of companies in the country for that purpose.The third largest Communications Group globally recently acquired search engine marketing company, Convonix. Last year the company bought  iStrat, Marketgate, Resultrix and Indigo Consulting.

Commenting on the latest acquisition, Vincent Digonnet, president (APAC) at Razorfish and Digitas, said, “Neev is providing us with the right engine, including an ability to deliver state-of-the-art web, e-commerce, mobile and social solutions. In addition, the acquisition will support the development capabilities of Razorfish technology teams in the US. Razorfish can now offer its services in India, complementing its presence in Greater China and Australia.”

The latest acquisitions by Publicis indicate that advertising and media firms have recognized the importance and need of the cloud services in the country after targeting digital media. Soon we might see others join the bandwagon and take a similar route.

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Twitter Rolls Out Keyword Targeting Ad Product

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 09:00:21 +0000

In a bid to further enhance its advertising business, Twitter has unveiled keyword targeting on the platform. The new tool will allow brands to advertise specifically to consumers based on the words they are tweeting. That means the content of your tweets will decide what kind of ads you will see on Twitter.

Dubbed as ‘keyword targeting in timelines’ the new ad targeting mechanism is available globally today for the advertisers. “Available in the full Twitter Ads UI and through the Ads API, this new feature enables advertisers to reach users based on the keywords in their recent Tweets and the Tweets with which users recently engaged. This is an important new capability – especially for those advertisers looking for signals of intent – because it lets marketers reach users at the right moment, in the right context”, Twitter product manager Nipoon Malhotra wrote in a blog post.

Citing an example Twitter says, “For example: let’s say a user tweets about enjoying the latest album from their favorite band, and it so happens that band is due to play a concert at a local venue. That venue could now run a geotargeted campaign using keywords for that band with a Tweet containing a link to buy the tickets. That way, the user who tweeted about the new album may soon see that Promoted Tweet in their timeline letting them know tickets are for sale in their area.”

In order to set up a campaign, advertisers can choose the keywords or phrase they want to target. Next, they can set more specifics, such as the location or gender of a user, or what device he or she is using. Twitter says that test runs with companies like Microsoft and Walgreens resulted in a jump in interactions with ads based on keyword targeting vs. other kinds of targeting. Malhotra assured that users won’t see any change to their Twitter feed and they will not see any more ads than they do already.

Twitter has aggressively expanded advertisers’ abilities to pinpoint ads on the platform for some time now. Last year in March it began allowing advertisers to run Promoted Tweets without first organically posting the tweet. Then it added interest targeting in September. And earlier this year, the company opened up an ad API so that third-party social ad firms could more easily help brands manage and automate their Twitter campaigns. The 200 million plus users micro blogging site also added more card types and plans to launch music app soon.

The new ad tool represents a big potential for Twitter, especially considering how much data is shared through the service. I feel Twitter’s new ad product can take advantage of these aggregated data sets thereby giving the company a huge advertising opportunity. What do you think?

Image Courtesy |   brandrepublic

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Facebook Gifts Goes Global, Comes To India, UK And Canada

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 09 Apr 2013 06:30:34 +0000

Facebook Gifts which was launched as a way for consumers to buy physical and digital gifts for their friends has now expanded to India, UK and Canada. However, users can only send gifts to their friends who live in the U.S. The service launched in September 2012, rolled out to all U.S. users by mid December, but it was not available in other countries until now.

I tried to send a gift to my brother living in US. As I went to his Facebook profile I spotted the ‘Send Gifts‘ icon. One can choose a gift from an array of options like gift cards and digital, food wine, flowers and gift baskets, style and so on.

The one which I found interesting was a home brewing kit. After choosing the appropriate gift, one has to select digital cards which are quirky and fun. You have to add a personalized message to the card.

The next step is the payment option for which users have can use Visa, Master Card, American Express and Discover. Currently, Facebook Gifts only accepts payments by credit cards and does not support net banking or debit cards.

We can either let the receiver view the gifts sent by a notification on his Facebook Timeline or let it be a surprise by not selecting the option. Facebook asks the recipient for the address for delivery of the gift. While digital cards are shipped within 24 hours, physical gifts might take 3 to 5 business days.

Rolling out Facebook Gifts to India makes sense as it is one of the largest market with a user base of 71 million monthly active users. This expansion increases the potential audience for Facebook’s relatively new monetization channel. Online gifting is gradually taking pace in India with new start-ups like Giftology, Dropgifts, Giftbig and Badhai.in. Recently we reported that Flipkart enabled international transactions.

I personally think that online gifting is easy and it might not be too long before it becomes a trend. What do you think about Facebook Gifts? Will you send something for your friends and family in US?

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Worldwide Devices Shipments To Soar 9% to 2.4 Billion Units In 2013

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 12:38:35 +0000

The days of the desktop PC are coming to an end, with a new study from Gartner revealing that most consumers now view tablets as their new main computing device. The shipment of global devices (personal computers, tablets and mobile phones) is expected to total 2.4 billion units in 2013, a 9 %increase from 2012, according to a Gartner study.

The study reveals that the proliferation of lower-priced tablets and their growing capability is accelerating the shift from PCs to tablets. Gartner predicts that device shipments will continue to manifold reaching to more than 2.9 billion units in 2017. The firm expects a 7.3% decline in the traditional desktop and laptop computer category this year, although ultramobile devices are expected to offset the decline slightly. The collective drop for these two categories is projected to be 3.5%.

Gartner projects global tablet shipments to total 197 million units in 2013, a 69.8% increase from 2012 shipments of 116 million units. “Lower prices, form factor variety, cloud update and consumers’ addiction to apps will be the key drivers in the tablet market. Growth in the tablet segment will not be limited to mature markets alone. Users in emerging markets who are looking for a companion to their mobile phone will increasingly choose a tablet as their first computing device and not a PC“, said Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner.

The report reveals that smartphones are becoming more affordable, driving adoption in emerging markets and the prepaid segment in mature markets. Not surprisingly of the 2.4 billion units expected to be sold this year, 1.875 billion of them are expected to be mobile phones. One billion units of these mobile phones are projected to be smartphones, compared with 675 million smartphone units in 2012.

Gartner seconded the recent IDC’s report about Android tablets outselling Apple’s. The firm said Google’s Android continues to be the dominant operating system in the device market, and competition for the second spot will be between Apple’s iOS/Mac OS and Microsoft Corp.’s Windows.

I think that affordability and flexibility are the two most important factors that are responsible for growing demands of these devices. With launch of such smart devices increasing by day, there will come a time in near future when PCs will become obsolete. What do you think?

Top image Courtesy | geek

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Google’s Eric Schmidt Urges India To Invest In Open Internet

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 09:11:49 +0000

Google Inc’s executive chairman Eric Schmidt has told India that it needs to stop policing the web and instead focus on innovation. Following his visit to North Korea, Schmidt has continued his tour by visiting India, which is arguably one of the biggest potential markets.

He has written an open piece in The Times of India asking the Indian Government to focus on how the internet can help its citizens and businesses. Urging Indians to choose free internet Schmidt says, “Now is the moment for India to decide what kind of internet it wants for them: an open internet that benefits all or a highly regulated one that inhibits innovation,” he wrote.

India is one of the most vibrant emerging markets for tech development and start-ups and Schmidt has therefore urged the government to stop pursuing control of the Internet and instead focus on how technology can help the population and local businesses. It is a message that both Schmidt and Google find increasingly important as the company wades deeper into national and international policy issues.

The country has tried to crack internet freedom in recent times. Schmidt touted that the Indian Government needs to focus its efforts away from trying to censor  the likes of Google, Facebook and Twitter. He argues that an unrestricted internet will foster local innovation and will allow small local companies to fix the problems India is facing, much better than a foreign company would.

Schmidt’s article sought to show that the government should view the internet as a way to improve and develop the country, rather than threat to national security and morals. It can be used to disseminate knowledge and enhance education and dialogue. He supported the same by citing the example of Finance Minister P.Chidambaram’s recent Google+ Hangouts session the Planning Commission’s interactive chat on India’s 12th five-year Plan. “Only about two billion of the world’s seven billion people have an Internet connection, and I believe the remaining five billion will get one in the next decade. Almost one billion of them will come online in India,” he says. Schmidt also said that rather than using its resources to policing the web, the Indian government could “reap a huge dividend” from the internet’s growth and use it to address some of the pressing and persistent problems facing the country today.

Finally Schmidt concludes asking the government to to focus on allowing Indians to use the Internet to improve the country, rather than being pessimistic about it. He said, “If people in power are overly pessimistic about the internet, their pessimism will be self-fulfilling. In seeking to control all of it — including the good parts that are working well — they’ll stop good Indians from doing great things.”

I hope the government will not turn a blind eye to Schmidt’s call on limiting web censorship. Time and again we have seen instances where an individual’s online right has been questioned. Its time for government to worry less about this and more about the fact that the country needs to improve and invest for a better internet connectivity.

Image Courtesy | ibnlive

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Rocket Internet’s Samwer Brothers Kickstart $194M Fund

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 06:43:10 +0000

Oliver and Marc Samwer, founders of Rocket Internet start-up incubator have teamed up with former Delivery Hero co-CEO Fabian Siegel to start Global Founders Capital , a new $194 million fund for high-potential internet businesses. Global Founders Capital (GFC) will invest globally and across all stages from seed to growth stage companies.

The fund will allow the Samwer Brothers to expand their empire, which reportedly includes some 27,000 people working across a portfolio of mainly e-commerce businesses in 43 countries. It will also give the brothers access to new types of businesses which they are currently not supporting through their Berlin incubator, Rocket Internet. Highly successful digital entrepreneurs, the Samwer Brothers have major investments in Facebook, LinkedIn , Groupon and Zynga. In Indian scenario Rocket Internet currently has funded start-ups like Jabong, FabFurnish, HeaveandHome, OfficeYes.com and others. Last year in September the incubator ventured into daily deals site with Cuponation.

As Rocket Internet operates mainly in the e-commerce space, it will be one of the domains in which the newly launched GFC invest. GFC, which plans to announce its first deals later this year, will focus on start-ups in the Middle East, North Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Besides e-commerce, GFC is likely to consider investing in start-ups associated with apps, big data solutions and travel. It must be noted that GFC will not be backing companies in the same segment which are already incubated by Rocket Internet.

If the GFC plan to invest in India, it will be interesting to see what kind of start-ups it chooses. It will be nice to see if it picks a non e-commerce start-up as that space has been overly crowded and funded by major VC.

Image Courtesy | farehames

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Gaana Finally Launches Mobile App For Windows Phone

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 12:23:50 +0000

Gaana which landed on Android, Blackberry, iOS and Java in January has now come to Windows phone. Last month, Times Internet’s music streaming service announced that the Windows appwas in the final stages of its development and would be out in the next few weeks.

The Windows app was unveiled today by Satyan Gajwani, CEO of Times Internet Limited at Microsoft’s TechEd 2013 event in Bangalore. The app has been developed in collaboration with Microsoft t. Users can share their music experience on Facebook with their friends. Other features include playlists, radio and favorites that are already seen on other mobile platforms. Lastly, an integration with Live Tiles gives users the song information on the home-screen.

Gaana which is relatively new compared to its established competitors like Saavn and Dhingana recently announced that its mobile apps have crossed a 200,000 download figure in just 2 weeks of its release. The music streaming service claims to have around 1 million songs. Last month Gaana.com expanded its regional music catalogue by joining hands with  South Indian Music Companies Association (SIMCA).

Growth in music consumption (both online and mobile) is expected to drive the music industry to revenues of over INR 20 billion by 2017, as per the latest FICCI-KPMG Indian Media and Entertainment-Industry Report 2013.

Gaana, unlike Dhingana and Saavn is the first one to land on the Windows platform. Finally, Gaana is also expected to introduce Gaana+ feature soon which will allow offline listening of your favorite songs.

Have you tried Gaana? What are your thoughts about the service? Let us know.

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Goibibo Launches Android App For Bus Booking

Sneha Bokil-Paranjape — Tue, 19 Mar 2013 10:00:41 +0000

Online travel booking portal Goibibo has unveiled mobile app for handsets working on Android operating system. The app allows users to search and book flights and bus tickets.

As per the company release, its bus booking service lets users to select across 12000 routes, compare prices across 9000 bus merchants. Users can also select seats and pick-up points for their bus travel. The company claims to have 15% more successful bookings for bus tickets on mobile than desktop within mere 48 hours of the launch of the mobile app.

The app’s interface is very simple and intuitive. When we launch the app we see six domains like Flight Booking, Bus Booking, My Booking, Search mTicket, Recent search and Login. As we enter each domain we see the standard interface for travel bookings. I tried to book a ticket from Bangalore to Pune but could not proceed to seat selection process. Later, the app hung every time I tried to book a bus ticket from different destination. We called the concerned source about the issue and they said that the delay in the seat selection process is due to their ticket vendors.

Update: The app seems to be working properly now.

Goibibo plans to add hotels verticals to the app in near future. Also when we checked Goibibo’s site it said that an iOS app is coming soon. Last week Goibibo launched a flight recommendation engine that helps you select best flight as per your budget and convenience.

Meanwhile let’s hope the company fixes the bugs in the apps soon.

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