Greystripe debuts new mobile gaming platform

By Dan Butcher

June 27, 2008

Michael Chang is CEO of Greystripe

Greystripe, a mobile in-game advertising specialist, has launched a mobile engagement ad-supported gaming platform.

Greystripe currently offers full-screen mobile ads that appear at the beginning and end of game play, which it claims have a 10.1 percent click-through rate worldwide. The company will now include more points of contact with the consumer, including branded off-deck-portals, branded wallpaper and a link to the advertiser's WAP site, as well as letting the brand sponsor each gaming session.

"With our new Mobile Engagement Platform, advertisers can now take over an entire user experience by branding the in-game on-device portal on each game with a custom menu that includes links to their WAP sites, branded wallpaper and other customizable features," said Michael Chang, CEO of Greystripe, San Francisco.

"This ODP gives the brand a lasting contact with the consumer," he said. "By sponsoring each game play, the brand ties their name to the content that users have sought out."

Greystripe currently powers more than 70 download sites, including Simyo, Opera Mini, Mocospace, Samsung Fun Club, Myxer and Zedge. Its own online and mobile Web portal is at http://www.gamejump.com.

Consumers can play Greystripe's mobile games free-of-charge, which drives traffic and provides a captive audience. Mobile games typically cost between $5 and $12 per purchase.

Greystripe currently serves ads into more than 800 game titles from 100 publishers available on more than 1,400 handset models.

Best Buy, Jeep, Yahoo, RadioShack, Zagat and New Line Cinema have all run full-screen mobile gaming advertising with Greystripe, which provides complete campaign management and reporting metrics.

Greystripe users are given a number of advertiser-sponsored plays when they download a game. When they run out of plays, they must click to reconnect and gain additional plays, giving advertisers another opportunity to gain attention for their brand.

Through the Mobile Engagement Platform, advertisers that already have a mobile Web site can also provide their customers a branded download site hosted by Greystripe.

Greystripe said that 75 percent of its users are ages 18-34. Sixty percent of Greystripe's U.S. users are male.

"The mobile games business has been stuck at less than 3 percent of subscribers who download a game per month in the for-pay model, according to M:Metrics," Mr. Chang said.

"This model has stagnated largely because there is a lot of risk that users see in having to pay for a piece of content before really knowing if they like it or not," he said.

The for-pay mobile gaming model has also created a market demand for pirated mobile games through services such as Bittorrent. Type "mobile game" into a Bittorrent search engine and consumers can find every major mobile game title.

"Greystripe's 'free, ad-supported' games, as opposed to 'free, pirated' content, takes an Internet-like approach in which we make discovery very easy," Mr. Chang said.

"Users will consume a lot more, be educated on the huge entertainment value of mobile games and in the end boost mobile game revenues for the whole industry, which has been addicted to the premium for-pay model," he said.