Jack's Opinion

I have worked on computers since 1982 almost every day. I had my first internet connection in the early ’90s. Since 1994 I am more or less in online marketing. I tweet, I bing, I facebook, I wrote books. But I never ever wrote my own blog. I never thought I needed to, but too many people are telling me I should share my thoughts with others. By the way, you might think my English is weird. You are right; I am originally from Germany. Please excuse any uncommon grammar or unorthodox spelling.

Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Smart phones allow real geo targeting

Advertisers are trying to geo target their audience since years over the Internet, but the biggest issue is that an ip address can't give enough info. It could be a wide range of possible location or even gives a wrong location information depending who your provider is. I use road runner and had several times an ip address which is based in Miami, even if i am in Tampa.
But smart phones are changing the landscape. Most of the smart phones have gps which can give advertiser an exact position of the consumer, and if gps is not available voice towers do a good job too. Usually it takes three towers to define the location pretty accurate (not so good like gps but good enough).

We are now able to build small apps for smart phones which will display coupons or special discount depending where the consumer is. Imagine you run a "coupon app" when you are at a store or in a mall and it would instantly tell you about special discounts or coupons for the store you are.
The sky is the limit and I am pretty sure we see soon a lot investment into mobile advertising using real geo targeting.

- Posted using My iPad

Location:NW Shore Blvd,Tampa,United States