Boingo and Google didn’t name the specific malls, saying only that at least four of them would be in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Tampa and Seattle. Google Offers will sponsor the service, meaning customers connecting to the hotspots with a smartphone, tablet or PC will encounter a welcome screen encouraging them to sign up for Google’s daily deal service. Regardless of whether customers sign up for the service or skip past the screen, they’ll get free, unrestricted access.

In New York, Google and Boingo have offered the promotion in six subway stations and 200 hotzones throughout Manhattan on a trial basis until Sept. 7. The two are also working together to offer discounted Wi-Fi access in sixteen airports. Google Offers will be selling a half-off 24-hour pass for Boingo’s global footprint, which customers can buy when they log into any of the airport networks.

Wi-Fi is already freely available from many restaurants, cafes, shops and other business that use the lure of free Internet to attract and retain customers (Boingo just signed a deal with the Wendy’s fast food chain to manage its free network), but at high-traffic locations with captive customers – airports, hotels, conference centers, etc. – paid Wi-Fi is still a big revenue generator.

A growing number of locales are trying to change up that business model, shifting the costs from consumers to advertisers. Boingo just bought Cloud Nine Media, a sponsored Wi-Fi deal broker. Another player in the public Wi-Fi space Advanced Wireless Group is starting to challenge Boingo’s dominance in U.S. airports, offering a multi-tiered Wi-Fi subscriptions ranging from free ad-supported access to paid prioritized access. It’s already cut deals with 15 U.S. airports.

In New York, the city is working with Van Wagner Communications to turn payphones into Wi-Fi hotspots that require users to visit the city’s tourism website to get access but could feature advertising in the future. Even AT&T is getting into the act, offering free video-ad supported access at Dallas Fort Worth International Airport.

Featured image source: flickr user kevinspencer; Wi-Fi image courtesy of Flickr user suttonhoo

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You may have already seen some of Cloud Nine’s works in a few major airports. When logging into a hotspot, instead of getting the usual registration and payment screen, a terms-of-use page pops up offering to show you a video or ads in exchange for 30 minutes or more of free Wi-Fi access. AT&T is launching a similar service at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport this September.

Boingo had been testing the sponsored Wi-Fi model working with Google Offers to provide ad-supported Wi-Fi in New York City subways and with American Express to do the same at a handful or airports. According to Christian Gunning, Boingo VP of corporate communications, sponsored Wi-Fi has been in increasing demand especially as Boingo expands beyond airports and convention centers into more consumer-centric locations such as malls, restaurants and stadiums where the expectations are much higher that Wi-Fi should be gratis. Gunning said in an email interview:

“… [W]e’ve historically outsourced this capability. As our consumer segment growth continued (and along with it the need for more sponsored access), it became evident that having this capability in-house would be beneficial.  Cloud Nine Media has built a strong business specializing in the delivery of sponsored Wi-Fi. They have a proprietary sponsorship platform that gives us the ability to deliver these sponsorships ourselves, as well as generate valuable data for sponsors. Bringing advertising/sponsorship expertise in-house puts us in a much stronger position to fulfill corporate goals.”

Boingo runs a global hotspot of network of 500,000 hotspots, though don’t expect every hotspot it owns or manages to suddenly stop taking credit cards. Many of its restaurant and café venue partners already offer Wi-Fi free to the public as a means of attracting customers – Boingo just signed a deal with Wendy’s to connect thousands of fast food restaurants. But the biggest part of Boingo’s business comes from subscriptions, which allows laptop, smartphone and mobile device customers to instantly connect to its global hotspot network for a monthly fee.

It’s likely Boingo will run the “free” service and the subscription service in parallel, generating revenue from non-subscribers through advertising while charging its customers monthly fees to access the same hotspot. The benefit of the subscription model, though, is that it treats all of Boingo’s disparate hotspots as a single network. Subscribers with the proper software on their devices not only bypass advertising, they don’t have register at every hotspot they encounter.

Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, though Boingo may be more forthcoming on the financial details at its earnings call scheduled Wednesday afternoon.

Airport image courtesy of Flickr user Michal Osmenda; Wi-Fi image courtesy of Flickr user suttonhoo

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