Ad-Serving Functionality Transforms Mobile Advertising Into a Highly Relevant Experience for Advertisers and Consumers

 

NEW YORK and MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIF.,  Feb. 6 — CBS Mobile and Loopt, a revolutionary social mapping and communications service, today announced a milestone agreement to deliver the first location-based mobile Web site advertisements in the United States. Through this partnership, advertisers will be able to take advantage of GPS and other localization technology to reach on-the-go consumers at their physical location, enabling them to target users who are near a particular place of business. 

 
"Location-based advertising is the sweet spot in mobile marketing," said Cyriac Roeding, Executive Vice President, CBS Mobile.  "We are thrilled for CBS to be the first media company in the country to help our clients realize highly relevant, yet non-intrusive mobile ads using location-based technology. Through our partnership with Loopt, our advertisers will be able to deliver targeted messages to potential customers who, based on their location, might be very likely to click or make a purchase. This makes the ads highly relevant to consumers and advertisers at the same time."

 
CBS's mobile sports and news Web sites already produced close to 75 million page views and 5 million unique users [in Q4 2007], making CBS Sports Mobile (wap.cbssports.com) one of the highest-traffic ad-supported mobile Web sites in the U.S. Today's announcement broadens the substantial advertising options already available across CBS Mobile WAP sites.  As with other CBS Mobile advertising, the location-based opportunities will be available across major U.S. wireless carriers.

 
"Together with CBS, we are leveraging the growth of the mobile Web and the power of location information to transform mobile advertising into a more integrated and useful service," said Sam Altman, CEO and co-Founder of Loopt. "If you're hungry and we take into account your location and time of day to display an ad for a restaurant offering free appetizers during happy hour, we've really blurred the line between advertising and content. It's a win for everyone — consumers, advertisers, Loopt, CBS and our carrier and developer partners." 

 
These location-based ads are not sent via SMS to consumers' mobile devices, but instead appear non-intrusively on mobile Web sites which consumers can access from their cell phones. Additionally, all such ads are served anonymously and location history is not stored. Ads will be available on CBS Sports Mobile and CBS Mobile News Web sites, on Loopt properties and its partner's Web sites.  All consumer location data used is privacy protected by Loopt and its partners under compliance with industry best practices.

 
About Loopt

Loopt, based in Silicon-Valley and backed by leading venture capital firms Sequoia Capital and New Enterprise Associates, has created a revolutionary social-mapping service that changes the way friends connect, share and explore in the mobile environment. Leveraging the latest location-based technologies, Loopt automatically updates and delivers friend location maps, messages and alerts on mobile handsets and the Web. Loopt was designed with privacy considerations at its core and offers a variety of effective and easy-to-use privacy controls for subscribers. Loopt works with leading mobile, social networking, and online privacy and security organizations such as the Center for Democracy & Technology, Family Online Safety Institute (member, board of directors), Cyber Safe California (member, advisory board), ConnectSafely.org, Congressional Internet Caucus Advisory Committee, and Ponemon Institute. Loopt is also TRUSTe certified. For more information, please visit www.loopt.com.

 
About CBS Mobile

CBS Mobile, a division of CBS Interactive Inc., is charged with building CBS Corporation's wireless business across entertainment, sports and news for CBS, The CW, and CBS Paramount Television. As part of this mission, CBS Mobile offers consumers some of the most innovative and best-of wireless content available today, ranging from the nation's first mobile video alerts for CBS Mobile News, CBS Sports Mobile and entertainment properties, to some of the nation's largest mobile Web sites, made-for-mobile video on all major carriers, a 24/7 mobile television network, and partnerships with the world's more leading edge mobile technology and ad targeting companies.  CBS Interactive, Inc. is a division of CBS Corporation (NYSE: CBS.A and CBS).