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Corona increases brand awareness, beer sales via mobile sponsorship

Corona is the launch sponsor of Thrillist?s iPad application and is engaging affluent male consumers with the brand, as well as offering a beach getaway just by interacting with the content. 

The Thrillist for iPad app features local recommendations for places to eat, drink, and shop in a consumer?s neighborhood. The app is available in Apple?s App Store for free download.

?The response from the ad community has been incredible and encouraging,? said Chris Steib, director of product development at Thrillist, New York. 

?Corona is our initial launch partner, with some really sexy beach-themed ads, and we're sold out through the rest of the calendar year with other clients,? he said.

?Right now the app is sold as a month-by-month exclusive takeover; depending on the number of installs and the rate of adoption, we might be able to change that in 2012 to deliver ads locally or across verticals, like we do with email and Web.? 

Corona time
When users log-in to the application they see the Corona ad within the Thrillist app.

Corona is featuring background ads within the iPad app.

The ads show the company?s beer bottles and say ?Tap For a Chance to Win a Corona Beach Getaway.?

?Our in-app browser opens up to the URL of the client's choice ? takes over the screen, but doesn't leave Thrillist,? Mr. Steib said. ?In this case, it's Corona's beach giveaway sweepstakes homepage on Facebook and it may require log in.

?There's a huge sales component to this,? he said. ?Our clients are always looking for new, unique ways to reach out to a very targeted, very loyal audience of affluent-male-20-something readers ? iPad's right smack in the middle of that demographic."

App features
The app use GPS to find Thrillist recommendations closest to users and lets them browse nearby and undiscovered neighborhoods and recommendations.

Readers can add articles to the My Thrillist section and view the best of the Web with the company?s daily picks

?First, 25 million devices is hard to ignore,? Mr. Steib said. ?Even though the number was lower when we first started thinking about iPad, it was obvious that owning the device would become something of a cultural status symbol ? so having a native app for it would be a business status symbol all the same.

?Making a native app is a gesture, showing you're not just checking a box to say ?we're on iPad,? but that you've cared enough to build something custom for that unique, tactile experience,? he said.

?Mobile is 100 percent aligned with our content, sales, and user-acquisition strategies.?

According to Mr. Steib, mobile compliments the daily emails by letting users find any Thrillist article that is relevant to their need ? be it the most popular or the nearest, or one of their favorites that they've added to the My Thrillist section.

?The apps are very well monetized, and we find that a ton of readers are discovering Thrillist for the first time via our app,? Mr. Steib said. ?Combined, these elements make mobile a critical part of our business.

?And now that we've been mobile for a year, we'll be able to dive deep into the data and start thinking about what new content and features we can create for a mobile-optimized ? if not mobile-exclusive ? experience,? he said.