First iAd Campaigns Come To iPhone

With Apple launching its new iAd network last week, and the first few advertising campaigns using iAd popping up, it is time to have a look at whether these campaigns are delivering on the anticipation.

The new service has received a lot of media attention and has been predicted to be a big hit. According to Apple CEO Steve Jobs, Apple has developed iAd to “help developers make money through advertising so they can keep their free apps free.”
Some of the key features of iAD include:

• iAd will allow advertisers to deliver interactive ads to consumers without them leaving the original app
• easy to implement, as it is built into the iPhone OS
• very interactive, providing full access to all the special features of iPhone prouducts

(for more information on iAd, see MobiAD artile A Big Month For Apple: The Future of iPhone & iAd
And these benefits do not come cheaply; earlier reports have suggested that Apple is charging about $1 million to the first advertisers across the network. This has not stopped major brands from signing up with companies such as Walt Disney, Citigroup, Nissan, AT&T, Unilever, Target, Best Buy, and many more already committing around $60 million for 2010.
One of the first iAd ads which has actually been seen is one for Nissan’s new electric Leaf car. As demonstrated in the video below, clicking on the banner ad from within the app brings up an ad that is fully interactive. Here are a couple of images from the Nissan ad, plus a short video that shows it in action.






Another example of one of the early iAd adverts is for Unilever’s Dove brand which stars US major league baseball stars Albert Pujols and Andy Pettitte. The iAd includes interviews with these athletes, provides a virtual tour of their homes, plus various other content and a sweepstakes.
Below is a short video from ClickZ that demonstrates the Dove Men+Care iAd advertisement.




Keith Weed, Unilever’s Chief Marketing Officer, who led the trip to the West Coast said, “Unilever has always been an innovator in advertising – from the first black & white and color advertising on UK TV, to Dove ‘Evolution’ being the first online ad to win the Lion d’ Or at Cannes – and we are now leading marketing into the digital age where the key will be to unlock the potential of mobile.”
Babs Rangaiah, Unilever’s Vice President Global Communications Planning and the person who put together the iAd deal said, “We know that 25 percent of the world is online now, but the next 75 percent will mostly get online via mobile – and mostly in D&E markets. This partnership will offer us the ability to work within what we believe will be the future of the mobile internet – APPS.”

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In both of these iAd examples, the ads are very polished with high-production value. They seem to provide a good level of consumer focused information, and utilize the unique attributes of mobile and iPhone to encourage consumer interaction.

Given that Apple has mandated that they be involved with the iAd production process, it is not surprising that these first iAds seem quite high quality. What will take some time to determine however is whether or not over the long term they can provide such a compelling consumer experience that they are worth the price to the advertiser.