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BANNERS ADS TO DIAL UP MORE ROI
27 October 2006

 

An Australian company has secured the exclusive global rights to an online advertising product that has media agencies here and overseas excited about its potential to drastically increase conversion rates. Its success could see a shifting of budget away from traditional direct marketing, predicts one media agency.

 

Called Banner to Call for Advertisers, the product is similar to the click-to-call technology Google is trialling in the US that allows consumers to click on an AdWords link and be connected to the advertiser via internet phone.

However, the big difference with the Banner to Call product is that consumers can type their phone numbers directly within any visually based web ad be it a banner ad, online video ad or animation and be contacted in about two seconds by the advertiser's call centre.

 

Australian company Facilitate Digital, which recently opened an office in Europe, secured the exclusive deal with technology developer Nascomms to sell the product globally.

 

To date, more than a dozen Australian agencies have expressed interest, including Zenith Optimedia, Starcom Digital, OMD, One Digital, Universal McCann and Carat.

 

Zed Digital, Zenith Optimedia's recently rebranded digital arm, is the first agency in the world to trial the advertising tool for its client Foxtel, and expects to roll out further live trials for other clients in the next six months.

 

"We've already had conversations with other clients and we're likely to offer this to them early next year, if not before," Matt Houltham, Zed Digital's strategy partner, told B&T.

 

Similarly, Starcom Digital is keen to trial Banner to Call for its financial services and telecommunications clients, with the agency's national business director, Brendon Cropper, signalling a potential shift of money away from traditional direct marketing should the product take off.

 

Banner to Call will launch in Australia on October 30 and across Europe next month. Asia and the UK will follow next year.

 

Facilitate Digital's CEO, Ian Lowe, said the response in Europe, as in Australia, had been "overwhelming".

 

The technology's main advantage, he said, was that it allowed advertisers to use a mass medium to communicate one-to-one and in real time with consumers, "at the very point in time the consumer has expressed interest in the product, which would ultimately result in higher conversion rates".

 

Lowe also believes this technology would further grow the online advertising sector and deliver advertising opportunities to those who didn't traditionally use digital communications.

 

"For example, with a banner ad for Pizza Hut, when the consumer types their phone number into the ad, we can route the number to their nearest store, so there are opportunities for local applications, where understanding the location of a customer is directly related to how an advertiser sells their product," he said.

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