Telefonica mulls outdoor insight offering
O2-parent Telefonica is mulling a move to offer real-time data for outdoor media-planning, the latest development in its transformation from an orthodox telecoms operator to an integrated digital outfit.
Telefoncia has made no secret of its ambitions to introduce fees from serving its users ads and has already launched its O2 More service in the UK, plus it has multiple tie-ups with operators from across the globe to make mobile advertising a scaleable business.
Speaking with Marketing Week, Simon Birkenhead, Telefonica global advertising sales director, says his team continues to work with its Telefonica Dynamics Insights team to offer insights to third-party brands.
The operator is already working with an as yet unnamed number of UK retailers providing them with insights on footfall trends, etc, through its Smart Steps product.
This product anonymously tracks O2 customers’ footfall, analyses trends within this data and can then uses an algorithm to establish how this translates to the wider population.
However, Birkenhead notes how this can potentially be further developed into a “real-time data” product, which could be made available to advertisers in order to more intelligently plan their outdoor advertising activity.
A Telefonica spokesman told Marketing Week that such as launch was a “potential application” but did note that it was focusing on using Smart Steps to continue its work with retailers for the foreseeable future.
Rival mobile operators EE and Vodafone also offer similar services to brands with the former’s mData unit already up and running in the UK and the latter’s Vodafone Footfall Analytics currently being touted by its Global Enterprise Unit.
