Growth in Call-Based Advertising Spawns 'Purchase Intercept Market' for Redirecting Valued Telephone Leads to Businesses

CHANTILLY, Va., June 27, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Explosive growth in call-based advertising, driven in part by mobile proliferation, will lead to major advances in call analytics and call quality, according to a new report by BIA/Kelsey titled, "Call-Based Ads: Eliminating the Unknown From Advertising." In the report, BIA/Kelsey analyzes the issue of call quality, which the firm anticipates will lead to category-level targeting for redirecting telephone leads to businesses.

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"We universally hear from call-based businesses that while call volume is growing, getting enough high-quality calls to businesses is the single largest challenge," said Matt Booth, chief strategy officer and program director, Interactive Local Media, BIA/Kelsey. "The massive influx of calls combined with a high percentage of unwanted calls, opens up a new and critical business segment around call analytics and call quality."

BIA/Kelsey recently reported that in 2011 the average U.S.-based business received 10.9 calls per month from desktop search (and all downstream properties through SEO) and 34.7 calls per month from mobile (including mobile search). In 2013 the average U.S.-based business will receive 13.8 calls per month as a result of desktop search and 80.9 calls from mobile.

"Like BIA/Kelsey we expect mobile call volumes to increase significantly, but the key will be optimizing programs for quality calls," said Bill Dinan, president of call measurement company Telmetrics. "Businesses are already using mobile call-based ads to capitalize on consumers' expanding mobile usage. From Q1 2011 to Q1 2012, we saw an increase of more than 30 times the number of mobile pay-per-call ads on our network."

Defining the 'Purchase Intercept Market'

According to the report, locating call sources across mobile, local, apps, voice, search, etc., and then using category-level targeting to redirect interest to a new business is a complex, yet worthwhile, undertaking. BIA/Kelsey calls this the "purchase intercept market," because these consumers are far down the purchase funnel, making these calls highly valued.

By 2016 BIA/Kelsey estimates close to 4 billion calls will be intercepted and redirected to businesses that want these leads. The purchase intercept market call volume will grow at a 52.1 percent CAGR from a base of 144 million calls in 2010 to 3.78 billion by 2016. BIA/Kelsey expects the combination of mobile and ad targeting to cause the U.S. purchase intercept market to be worth $4.9 billion by 2016.

The BIA/Kelsey Advisory, "Call-Based Ads: Eliminating the Unknown From Advertising," is available exclusively to clients of the firm's Interactive Local Media (ILM) advisory service. The 48-page report includes 32 charts and figures and profiles of nine key players in the pay-per-call/call-tracking arena: CallSource, Felix, Freespee, LogMyCalls (a service of ContactPoint), Marchex, Mongoose Metrics, RingRevenue, Soleo and Telmetrics. For information on obtaining access to the report by becoming a client of BIA/Kelsey's ILM advisory service, visit http://www.biakelsey.com/ILM, or contact Steve Passwaiter at (703) 802-2973 or [email protected].

Call-based advertising will be one of the topics discussed during a panel on mobile monetization at today's Mobile Local Media San Francisco conference. Details about the agenda, speakers and online registration are available at www.biakelsey.com/mlmsf.       

About BIA/Kelsey

BIA/Kelsey advises companies in the local media space through consulting and valuation services, research, Continuous Advisory Services and conferences. Since 1983 BIA/Kelsey has been a resource to the media, mobile advertising, telecommunications, Yellow Pages and electronic directory markets, as well as to government agencies, law firms and investment companies looking to understand trends and revenue drivers. BIA/Kelsey's annual conferences draw executives from across industries seeking expert guidance on how companies are finding innovative ways to grow. Additional information is available at http://www.biakelsey.com, on the company's Local Media Watch blog, Twitter (http://twitter.com/BIAKelsey) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/biakelsey).

SOURCE BIA/Kelsey