Steve Jobs and Apple just took the next big step advertisers have been waiting for. On Thursday, April 8, the iPhone OS 4 was introduced to the world. Its eagerly anticipated multitasking capabilities were the expected benefit, but the real hype for marketers is definitely over iAd.
iAd represents Apple’s big leap into mobile advertising. As announced, the ads will reside “in-app” and be built in HTML5. Also revealed was Apple’s revenue-sharing model with app developers that will give them a 60 percent take of ad revenues. Apple will manage all ad sales, inventory management and hosting. Both the new OS and ad platform will be ready for consumption for the iPad this fall and will only further build the burgeoning market for mobile advertising.
With multitasking, you can view ads while you stay in-app simply by halting the application in real-time and then returning to your app. Also, a GPS component will give advertisers the opportunity to provide targeted local advertising offers.
Yes, the creation of ads in HTML5 will be more expensive. Yes, this is a hit to Adobe Flash – the standard platform for web ads up to this point. And, yes, Apple is certainly not the first to market with this, but from a selfish standpoint, the iAd is only going to fast-track our mobile advertising opportunities. It’s just one more touch point for all of us to think about.
