# Mobile: From Ads to Commerce

By [Albert's Import](https://paragraph.com/@albertsimport) · 2016-11-28

mobile, advertising, commerce

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In 2011 I gave a talk at conference that [The Media Kitchen](http://mediakitchen.com/) had organized about the impact of mobile on marketing. While everyone else presenting was talking about how to make mobile ads work, I was openly critical of advertising on mobile platforms altogether arguing that ads were (a) mostly annoying given the small screen size and (b) likely to be replaced by direct commerce. I just tried to find my slides from that talk but unfortunately came up empty. 

I was reminded of the talk when I read a [post on Venturebeat this weekend](http://venturebeat.com/2016/11/26/what-if-google-and-facebook-got-it-all-wrong/) about the difference between Tencent’s model in China and Facebook’s and Google’s approach here. Tencent’s WeChat makes the bulk of its revenues from direct commerce, meaning in-app transactions. The post mentions that Facebook is pushing directly into transactions again. If Facebook pulls that off it will be a real threat to Google which does not have a successful messaging app itself (despite having launched several, [most recently Allo](http://mashable.com/2016/09/21/google-allo-app/#1zgD2zAe1OqF)).

Messaging apps are of course not the only way that direct commerce can happen on mobile. A few companies, such as Uber, will have their own apps that people install and use directly. Another way is for existing apps to integrate commerce functions, for instance using [Button](https://www.usebutton.com/). Location intelligence as provided by [Foursquare](https://developer.foursquare.com/) will also play a significant role here: for instance, if I can book a table at a nearby restaurant as I am walking through a part of town, that’s the kind of direct commerce experience that improves dramatically on ads.

So while this shift has been talked about for some time now, I believe we are reaching an important turning point. The big question though is still what this means for content consumed on mobile devices. And here too I think we will see a change with interesting [subscription offerings](http://continuations.com/post/129435726665/more-on-subscriptions-and-micropayments) being developed.

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*Originally published on [Albert's Import](https://paragraph.com/@albertsimport/mobile-from-ads-to-commerce)*