ChaCha has selected Mogreet?s mobile video ad serving technology to bring rich media, including pictures, audio and full sight, sound and motion to millions of the free answer service?s users.

Using Mogreet?s platform, ChaCha and its advertisers have the ability to incorporate videos and pictures into its mobile answer services, including video advertisements, sports highlights, movie trailers, interview clips, music videos, logos, photos, contests, news highlights, promotional messages and even coupons for redemption.

Advertisers also have the ability to insert media-rich ads in response to specific questions or keywords texted to ChaCha by the consumer.

Mobile Marketer?s Giselle Tsirulnik interviewed James Citron, CEO of Mogreet, Los Angeles. Here is what he had to say.

What types of services will Mogreet provide ChaCha?
Mogreet and ChaCha have formed a partnership to bring rich-media advertising to nearly every brand advertiser in the country across almost every phone.

Leveraging Mogreet's MMS video ad serving capabilities, ChaCha can now offer its list of  advertisers the ability to tell their story in sight, sound and motion to ChaCha?s active base of 25-plus million monthly users through the delivery of MMS video and image ads. 

Mogreet's ad serving platform performs the ad serving capabilities, including the assembly of the ad, the formatting of video and image ads for each carrier and device, and serves the ad in a user-friendly way into the millions of ChaCha questions and answers being sent each day.
 
What is the strategy behind the partnership?
Many of the largest brand advertisers who comprise the $50 billion television advertising business have not had the ability to tell their story using video to the majority of consumers on their mobile phones prior to the introduction of Mogreet's cross-carrier MMS ad serving solution. 

ChaCha recognizes that MMS is the only solution to enable brands and advertisers the ability to deliver high-quality, rich media ads to virtually any mobile device in the United States, including the 210 million Americans (75 percent of U.S. mobile population) that are not on smartphones today. 

This partnership should further help to accelerate the shift of traditional video advertising budgets into mobile video where ROI and response rates are easily measured and tracked, as well.

Mogreet?s platform provides the largest MMS reach in the world and guarantees that advertisers? messages are seen and heard in a timely, engaging and unique fashion.

How will this expand the capabilities ChaCha offers advertisers?
This partnership marks a significant step forward for ChaCha?s advertisers.

Marketers today view pictures, video and audio as essential elements for conveying their brand?s message and engaging with consumers and increasing their ROI from the mobile spend.

With this new service, ChaCha will help its advertisers for the first time deliver rich media to virtually any mobile device across almost any carrier.

ChaCha is offering advertisers a variety of ways to leverage MMS.

Advertisers can deploy rich media content such as sports and news highlights, video ads, movie trailers, interview clips, music clips and videos, logos, photos, contests and even coupons for redemption ? to name just a few examples.
 
MMS is typically included in carrier messaging plans, with no additional cost to consumers.

This provides significant reach and media benefits for advertisers.

For the past three years, nearly all phones shipped in the United States have been enabled with MMS capabilities.

Any brands already on board? Can you discuss?
ChaCha urges readers to stay tuned next week for announcements about some exciting new partnerships it is forging as a result of the new collaboration with Mogreet.
 
What is the current state of MMS and how do you expect that to change in 2011?
U.S. MMS volume is growing faster than SMS today and is doubling approximately every six months.

The biggest change in the MMS industry is that's it's become an established channel for marketers to engage with their audience.

In relation to SMS whose traffic is largely driven by consumer-to-consumer traffic, MMS's growth is being fueled by marketers who recognize that it's the only way to deliver rich media content and deep engagement to large audiences.

Today, MMS offers reach to 200 million-plus Americans today, which is three times larger than the mobile Web audience, as well as deep consumer engagement through multimedia.
 
I predict that in 2011, at least 25 percent of mobile advertising will come from MMS and that brands and advertisers will also use MMS as a mobile CRM tool, integrated with back-end CRM systems, to deliver relevant, contextual and personalized information to consumers, based on their demographics, preferences, behaviors, and location.

Final take
Here is a video that explains the ChaCha answers service:

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