MyScreen Mobile To Bring Its ‘Watch Ads In Exchange For Minutes’ Biz To The U.S.

Myscreen Mobile Rewards

MyScreen Mobile, the mobile advertising tech firm that’s backed by Orascom Telecom, is slated to launch its new ad platform. The service lets mobile phone subscribers get free minutes and other perks in exchange for viewing, watching or clicking on ads.

MyScreen says the frequency of its ads — they show up after every call — and the opt-in nature of the platform is what makes it attractive to advertisers. Unilever and Grupo Bimbo (parent company of the Boboli pizza and Arnold bread brands here in the U.S.) have signed on as the first big brands; the campaigns will go live in Mexico, Brazil and Argentina within “the next three or four weeks,” per Mediaweek. MyScreen plans to expand to the U.S. and Europe later in 2010.

The “watch ads in exchange for a perk” model has been tried with online publishing, as well as mobile. There’s Blyk — which has had most of its success overseas — and even then, only after it secured partnerships with carriers to be promoted on deck.

MyScreen is going the carrier route as well; it says it has “a potential 182 million mobile subscribers” accessible in its global network as a result of current partnerships. New deals should expand that to 500 million over the course of 2010.

As for the viability of its business model here in the U.S. — there’s room for opportunity, but also potential pitfalls. With almost every carrier offering some sort of all-you-can-eat minutes, texting and data plan, the lure of free airtime isn’t as attractive as it might have been even two years ago. But with families trying to stick to their budgets, MyScreen’s offering might be great for getting teens the extra minutes they’d crave. There’s also the potential to offset costs if U.S. carriers shift away from unlimited data plans, toward tiered billing, as AT&T (NYSE: T) has suggested it might do.

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