Opera Mediaworks Launches App-based Targeting for Ads

App phone illustrationMobile advertising platform Opera Mediaworks has launched technology that targets consumers based on their choice of apps.

The launch follows a study by the company that showed that while there are clear relationships between users choice of apps and how they interacted with advertising, it was not necessarily linear. For example, users with a high number of entertainment apps were actually less likely than other users to engage with entertainment ads.

The study used app choices to create 10 mobile personalities for different types of users and then examined how these personalities tended to engage with advertisements. Savvy Shoppers (users with mostly lifestyle, finance, retail and food & drink apps) and Health Aware users (those with mostly medical and weather apps) were the least likely to interact with mobile ads, while High Rollers (users with a high number of gaming, gambling and sports apps) were 43 per cent more likely to click on finance ads than other ads.

“Our mobile phones are glued to us all day and in many ways represent our digital DNA,” said Mark Slade, managing director for EMEA at Opera Mediaworks. “The apps we have reflect our personality and these in turn impact the type of ads we tend to interact with.

“Identifying and applying user profiles to ad targeting can significantly increase the probability of users interacting with mobile ads. This will offer real value to brands, advertisers and agencies alike and is the reasoning behind the launch of our app-based targeted technology.”