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| Facebook Stock Certificate |
With the Facebook IPO on the horizon, and its
estimated valuation reaching over $100B, this is a good time for mobile
operators to rethink their business models. Needless to say, Facebook has never
charged its users, asked them for their credit cards, or sent invoices to their
homes. Nevertheless, its revenues are expected to hit $5B in
2012, with 85% coming from ads. Facebook is capable of reaching these
enormous numbers primarily because businesses, no matter how large they are,
are always interested in increasing exposure to their products and services,
and are willing to share their revenues in order to do so.
So what does this have to do with mobile operators?
First, and this is obvious, the mobile internet is a sustainable
source of revenues for its industry. As Jon Stewart said about the internet, “it’s
a keeper.” This is good news for mobile operators struggling to maintain
revenues from traditional voice and messaging services in the face of
competition and regulation.
Second, for mobile
operators to compete in the Internet playing field, they need to get in the
game and start thinking more like Internet players, such as Facebook. Rather than sticking to
traditional subscription-based business models, they need to get creative. This
means not only selling their own content and services directly, but also using
their unique position between their users and the internet to offer interesting
and relevant content and services from anywhere on the web, using affiliation plans and revenue-sharing.
To do this, operators need to find the real-estate to effectively
present these recommendations and promotions to their users – either on the
monthly bill, their portal, or, for maximum visibility, within the browser
itself. Our monetization solution provides operators with this valuable real-estate - our web toolbar - and the supporting ecosystem to start generating and sharing revenues today.
-- Chen Didi-Barnea, Product Marketing Manager
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