Content Owners should avoid mobile network operators.

I was having lunch with a colleague the other day and we were talking about some content players that were desperate to have their service listed on one of the big operator portals! - we both laughed. She said, "If they do get to the Portal!, they'll be dead in a year."

Content partners who make eventually make it to the top of the deck don't stay their for long and die slow and painful deaths. Big operators (mobile network operators or mobile carriers in the US) want content owners to make loads of big changes to their service and then can take up to 6 months to pay you for your tiny content license fees.

It is a painful way to watch your business die after spending so much time and energy to get listed on the operator portal in the first place.

This week Clickz news talks about the Wireless Carrier Ad Promise and all I can say is "So what?"

Content owners and marketers need to stop being lured in by the siren song of big money through operator portals. Those waters are filled with nothing but crashing waves, shallow waters and huge rocks!
And if the operators think they are going to make money from selling banner ads across their own portal content then they are looking at a tiny - and short lived - revenue stream.
In 18-24 months 2 major trends will take hold that consumers will love, marketers will benefit from and operators will be terrified of - until they get to understand it.

• Affordable flat rate mobile data


• Elimination of walled gardens

Affordable flat rate mobile data

It has already started with some operators in the US - and even "3" in the UK has come out with flat rate mobile data plans that are affordable to consumers. Consumers have been on their home Internet with a virtually unlimited bandwidth for years. Until consumers can surf - without fear of costs - there will be limits to mobile data adoption.

And if the operators don't get it right soon - then not to worry - WiFi will come along and take care of the problem for them. More and more handsets are coming WiFi enabled. WiFi is freely accessible in some Internet cafe's and in other places it is being offered at low fixed cost package prices. If operators don't change their pricing structure, consumers will take their business to WiFi. (By the way - the handset manufacturers will love this!)

For the benefit of mobile data adoption - and to ensure that mobile consumers don't dump their operator's mobile data plan altogether in favour of cheap (and fast) WiFi access - Flat rate mobile data will arrive.

Elimination of walled gardens

Walled Garden: A business practice of mobile network operators to provide specific content that is designed specifically to be available to their own mobile subscribers, and often times to prevent subscribers from accessing any content that is outside the mobile operators portal.

Then - once consumers have the ability to surf freely without fear of high data charges, consumers will quickly tire of the limited content choice made available from the operators. They want the same level of choice on their mobile phone as they do on their home computers. I mean seriously - who lives completely within the Yahoo! or MSN portals? For Pete's sake - even AOL users are using the entire Internet these days!

And although I'm not a big fan of mobile search (largely because it is hard to see a winning business model more than because it isn't needed) consumers will soon be able to much more easily access content that is exactly what they want and is not found in the operators walled garden.

In a very short period of time the operators will be a small player in the mobile advertising market and will resume the job that they do best - which is running the network.

"Know what you're good at and know what you're not good at."

Operators are good at running networks - they are absolute crap at managing content - and even worse when it comes to planning and executing a marketing campaign that doesn't involve brand extension or minutes of airtime.

The result:

In 18-24 months there will be a few mobile Internet sites that everyone will come to know and will bookmark. There will be a "MySpace" of the mobile world. It may not be MySpace - but something like MySpace. People will access The Weather Channel and ESPN directly. Ebay mobile will come into its own. And all of these companies - that know how to run Internet businesses and monetize them from advertising - will do what they do best. And none of them will require consumers to use the operator portal.

If you are a content owner or a marketer trying to get an audience with a major carrier or network operator. STOP! Stop wasting your time and energy. Figure out the place on the Internet where your target customers will be going when they can truly access the content they want from their mobile device - for affordable flat rate data prices - and without walled gardens. Invest your time in a relationship that has long term viability!