Bena Roberts, founder and senior analyst at BKI Media, argues that mobile podcasts are the next big thing.
It’s a good rule of thumb that if services haven’t yet entered the mobile environment, they weren’t originally designed for it. The most obvious example is the mobile internet versus SMS, which is native to mobile phone technology. The mobile internet is struggling to become a mass medium whereas some 1.13 trillion SMS messages were sent worldwide in 2005, and the number is rising all the time.
Podcasting could be, finally, the so-called killer application to propel mobile internet into the mainstream. Unlike all the other mobile internet functions (TV, web browsing, email, search, MySpace and other social networking sites) which are about trying to move fixed location activities on to mobile, podcasting is designed for use on the hoof. It is the only true, new, made-for-mobile service on the market. Mobile podcasting provides audio and, as such, has a lot of parallels with the undisputed killer application of mobile overall – phone calls.
Consumers can listen to a mobile podcast in a number of ways. Users can dial up to listen to podcasts, just as though they were making a call. They can download podcasts or stream them - that is just listen to them ‘on air’ once. Podcasts can be accessed via a mobile portal, hosted by their network provider or a third party such as the BBC, or customers might sign up for podcasted SMS alerts that they listen to rather than read.
In the US, bucket mobile phone rates are commonplace and mobile podcasts are already popular. Instead of listening to the radio, US users are dialling in to listen to podcasts on their mobile devices when driving to work. This allows them to hear what they want to hear instantly, instead of having to tolerate everything on the radio to get the bits they’re interested in.
It is unlikely that this dial-up to listen style of podcast will be as popular in Europe because consumers are confused about what they will be charged; mobile price plans are littered with small print. The average podcast is three minutes long. Those three mobile call minutes can cost from nothing (as part of a monthly bundled package) to 40 pence per minute in the UK.
Instead, in Europe mobile voicemail podcasts is likely to be the winner. This is because users can sign up and listen to alerts as part of their flat rate deal, removing the fear of runaway bills that still mutes the uptake of new mobile services in Europe. 3 in the UK has offered a subscription type of podcast service with its Gold X-Series membership package.
In Asia too, the subscription model for mobile podcasts has already emerged. Here far fewer people have access to a PC, so mobile is many Asians’ primary internet access device - hence in Singapore, mobile service provider MI already offers podcasts as part of a bundled package for only US$5 a month. This is brave. In Europe it would be seen as suicidally cheap, but podcasting is combined with a host of other services, such as free Skype, which disguises podcasting’s true subscription cost.
Innovative ways of podcasting are being introduced via social networks, such as YouTube and Flickr, but the biggest jump forward will be when podcast RSS (the family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated digital content, including news and blogs) comes to mobile; subscribers will be able to listen to highlights of their favourite RSS feeds on their mobile phone instantly.
Alternatively, they will be able to get instant messaging (IM) alerts to audio RSS. Once the service is set up, it will be hard to leave. Audio, in the form of mobile podcasts could be the sticky (loyalty-generating) service mobile operators are desperate to find.
Later this month, most of world’s mobile industry will gather at its annual congress, 3GSM, in Barcelona. There will be lots of movement on the podcasting front. 3 UK was the instigator, O2 Ireland has joined in and operators in France and Spain are on the verge of launching new mobile podcasting offers. Mobile podcasting is not yet near the tipping point, but we expect it to be within two years, with new players emerging rapidly to join the likes of Melodeo, Mobilecast, Pod2Mob, UpSnap, Voice Genesis and Voice Indigo.
