Mobile advertising is showing a strong potential in the Middle East with 64 per cent of respondents believing it will mirror the successes of Internet advertising, according to a survey conducted by Acision.

The Mobile Advertising Survey was conducted at Gitex 2007, with almost 300 delegates from across the region responding. Acision is the world leaders in mobile messaging and charging.

The survey revealed that mobile advertising is already taking hold in the region, with 48 per cent of participants stating that they receive mobile ads two to four times a week. The survey also revealed, however, that regional consumers are demanding ads that are both relevant and engaging.

Asked how mobile advertising might be improved, the majority of respondents said that operators need to study their databases before sending out SMS ads, ensuring that they are relevant to the audience.

An Arabic SMS ad, for instance, should not be sent to a non-Arabic speaker. Irrelevant ads, respondents said, are deleted immediately.

The study also revealed that the preferred form of mobile advertising is through text messaging as opposed to visual. Some 18 per cent of respondents specified that there is still a need for advertisers to engage in more creative ads to capture the attention of consumers through multimedia messaging.

Managing director for Acision in the Middle East and North Africa Nabil Y Khalil said that mobile operators can overcome the challenges they face by turning to key technology players such as Acision.

'The survey results indicate a promising future in the region. Mobile advertising offers significant opportunities for precise targeting across all mobile data channels, along with the ability to provide users with highly personalised services. The key is keeping things lively and relevant, objectives that we at Acision work hard to achieve,' added Khalil.

Acision's mobile marketing offering allows mobile operators to generate advertising revenues, independent of third parties such as internet based advertising brokers. Acision goes beyond the current limitations of SMS-push or mobile internet based advertising and enables operators to insert advertising into any existing communications event, making mobile advertising part of the end to end service.

Acision's leadership and global expertise in Intuitive Messaging has helped the company become the partner of choice in high volume mobile data services for the region's leading telecoms operators, including Zain, Qtel, Oman Mobile and many others.- TradeArabia News Service