Standards for advertising in downloadable media will be proposed by the Association for Downloadable Media (ADM) today. With the release of these two proposals, “Downloadable Media Advertising Standards” and “Downloadable Media Audience Measurement Guidelines” one of the important goals behind the founding of the ADM will have been achieved. The ADM standards are intended to help evolve a common language to enable advertisers buying downloadable and portable media.
The downloading and mobile audiences are growing quickly. Arbitron-Edison Media research released this week shows rising Podcast consumption, now reaching 18% of the US population. Consumer habits are changing quickly, and the larger media landscape is being transformed rapidly. This rate of change is only bound to accelerate, as consumers avail themselves of freedoms afforded by the newer technologies. For example, if you own an iPhone (or one of the newer iPods), you are able to load videos onto the iPhone via iTunes, or directly download videos from the Internet and save it on the iPhone for later viewing, or stream videos to the iPhone screen while connected online. These consumption behaviors complement watching video in iTunes, on a larger screen notebook computer. Consumers will use all of these modalities to get the content they want. These consumers are a highly engaged audience, not casual web surfers who happen to trip upon a random link. They are committed to the media they receive, having vested considerable energy, time, bandwidth and storage. For media publishers these are unprecedented times, a great opportunity to carve out a unique niche in the emerging media landscape.
As the downloadable medium grows, so does the challenge for publishers and advertisers. How do you reach these audiences? What ad formats best suit this medium? How do you measure usage and engagement? As traditional TV and radio models become increasingly defunct, it becomes imperative there is a rapid maturing of standards reflecting the emerging mediums. The ADM can help.
Murgesh Navar
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