Your bus stop wants to chat

This bus shelter ad can be activated by the infrared on your Vodafone mobile phone.

Vodafone customers will be able to access free mobile content from bus shelter ads in a high-tech expansion of its "make the most of now" campaign.

In a New Zealand first, bus stops in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch will be equipped with the hypertag ads from next week.

Customers will be able to interact with the ads to access "tongue in cheek" tips to help make the most of time spent waiting for the bus.

The interactive ads signal the start of a new generation of bus shelter advertising made possible through eight specialist products unveiled last night by street furniture advertising business Adshel.

Outdoor Association of New Zealand chairman Duncan Harris says the products - which include the possibility of using sound, neon-like light and liquid in bus shelter ads - are a "classic example" of the type of innovation driving growth in outdoor advertising.

Harris says the innovations are positive because advertisers want new ways to use outdoor as they increasingly tune in to the medium's "larger-than-life opportunity".

Outdoor advertising spend grew steadily during the last decade from $9 million in 1996 to $77 million last year, Advertising Standards Authority figures show.

Adshel campaign services manager Aaron King says the new "create" package of products edge closer to the futuristic advertising ideas seen in Hollywood blockbuster Minority Report, where posters recognise shoppers and know what they want to buy.

King says the hypertag posters recognise if a mobile phone has accessed the site before and allow more interactivity between viewers and ads.

The new products launched yesterday are hypertag, liquid and EL paper, which creates neon-like light effects.

Others in the "create" range have been used before, including in a Newstalk ZB campaign in May last year that let people at bus shelters listen to the live broadcast via headphones and sound station technology.

King says the new products reinforce bus shelter advertising as "more than just a poster".

Bus shelters offer 24-hour and high-frequency advertising opportunities and could now connect more with customers.

Physical constraints - such as having a roof and seating - remain and safety rules limit lighting and sound not opted into by viewers.

Adshel is a joint venture between Clear Channel and APN News & Media, publisher of the Herald.

Vodafone general manager of brand and consumer marketing Larrie Moore says the hypertag ad works in with the company's "make the most of now" campaign.

"The insight we have is that people are living in a time-poor world and basically they want to spend the time they have doing the things that are important to them," says Moore.

Other campaigns are in the pipeline and could include the sponsored launch of songs, free ringtones and screen savers or information such as weather reports.

Moore says the hypertag will appeal to 20-35-year-olds who are into using mobile music and entertainment services.

The ads help brand development and taps in to the push to develop more interactive services.

"Communication companies the world over, including ourselves, are in the communications space predominantly at the moment but we are looking to grow these adjacent markets."

Darnell Dixon, general manager New Zealand of interactive mobile marketing company Hyperfactory, says the launch of hypertag follows seven months of local research and development to ensure the technology can communicate via infrared with common mobile phones.

Dixon says it is an example of the trend for marketing and entertainment moving closer together.

"We are talking to the brands and we are hearing from them how they want to engage with the consumer - they might want to touch a smaller group of people but more intensely. This type of technology allows it to be really rich and entertaining."


ON THE STREET

* Hypertag - which allows bus shelter advertisers to pass on free mobile phone content to consumers.

* Liquid - which fills bus shelter ad space with coloured, bubbling or moving liquid.

* EL paper - which produces neon-like light effects that can illuminate parts of ads in sequence.