Mobile is an important and necessary place for advertisers to be, but cost factors have inhibited small- to medium-sized businesses from entering the medium.

Personalized radio service Pandora is tackling this issue with an easier way for small and medium-size businesses to create and launch advertising campaigns on mobile devices. The company has launched a service that lets Pandora build mobile banners for advertisers at no additional cost.

?We?ve seen very high engagement rates when campaigns are localized on mobile, especially if a regional advertiser is offering some type of special deal,? said Brian Mikalis, vice president of advertising sales at Pandora, Oakland, CA. ?The advertisers we work with want to reach their target consumers whenever and wherever they are.

?On Pandora, more than half of our audience listens to their personalized stations via smartphones,? he said. ?Since we launched the team that works with SMBs at the beginning of this year, we?ve been offering the regional advertisers ad solutions that are traditionally reserved for national brands with very large budgets.

?Advertisers have been asking us how they can reach our mobile audience for a number of reasons. Our mobile ad solution is appealing since a consumer is on the go with their phone in hand, and can go to an advertisers? physical location or can call for more information when prompted by an ad.?

Over half of the daily listening on Pandora is on smartphones. With over 65 million registered listeners in the United States, this represents a truly significant local mobile audience in every market around the country.

Mobile for the masses
Local and regional businesses now have access to an affordable campaign implementation process to run localized campaigns on Pandora's mobile applications.

The expansion of Pandora's mobile advertising capabilities for SMBs complements current Web-based advertising options, allowing local and regional businesses to directly reach and connect with local consumers across multiple platforms.

To facilitate this new SMB advertising service, Pandora has expanded an existing partnership with
AdReady, a company that provides software for digital display advertising.

Consumers are spending more time on their mobile phones, and Pandora is enabling SMBs to reach customers as their media consumption changes. 

SMBs have traditionally thought of mobile as a platform they were not sure they could afford to be on.

?Traditionally, publishers only have the resources to work with national brands that have the largest budgets to spend on different advertising platforms,? Mr. Mikalis said. ?Pandora has a team in place that works on making options available to SMBs, we will build out the creative assets for advertisers ? including mobile ? and have a process in place to work with businesses with budgets of all sizes.?

Use case
Imagine a local car dealer that is trying to get users to its lot for a big weekend sale.

An audio ad on Pandora can let that user know about the sale, and a click on the banner could provide additional details as well as directions on how to get to the sale.

Pandora is structured to help advertisers reach this audience in a seamless way. The company sets up the targeting, builds the creative assets and helps advertisers track how well the campaign is working.

?When we talk to advertisers, we ask what audience they are trying to reach and what they are trying to accomplish with their marketing budget,? Mr. Mikalis said. ?All of Pandora?s listeners have registered for the service on the Web and mobile, so we can serve up ads based on age, gender and ZIP code.

?We can pinpoint target the exact audience an advertiser is trying to reach,? he said. ?On mobile, advertisers are only a few taps away from a user calling their business, or getting directions to drive to their store.?