Kiip believes that traditional methods of mobile advertising, especially for games, simply don’t work. So how do advertisers actually catch someone’s attention while she is playing Angry Birds, without the player getting angry with her phone? And how can games insert advertising that isn’t just a miniature banner ad?
Kiip’s answer: create a new type of network to replace the traditional advertising network. Kiip calls itself a rewards network. Instead of providing advertising for mobile games, Kiip provides real world prizes for in-game achievements such as reaching a new high score or beating certain game levels. For example, if a player reaches a new height record in Doodle Jump, a Kiip notification will appear at the bo ttom of the screen, letting the user know she’s won a reward. Clicking on the notification opens up a full-screen page that asks for the user’s e-mail address so she can redeem the aware.
“What we’re doing is creating a new category out of an industry that is truly in need for a breath of fresh air,” Kiip co-founder and CEO Brian Wong told Mashable. “I think that we have too long been fixated with screen estate and the attention exchange as being a key part of the advertising equation.”
Kiip launches today with an impressive list of launch brand partners, including 1-800-FLOWERS, Carl’s Jr., Dr. Pepper, Popchips, Sony, Sephora, Vitaminwater, Popchips, GNC and Homerun.com. Kiip isn’t revealing which games are testing out its novel advertising platform for another two weeks (it wants unadulterated gameplay to test and fix the kinks), but Wong did reveal that its ~15 launch partners have a combined re ach of over 12 million...
