Israel’s largest mobile operator, Cellcom has launched an advertising funded mobile games service. Subscribers get free games downloads that are sponsored the likes of Nokia, McDonalds, Samsung, Adidas and Walt Disney.

Using technology from innerActive, the ad exposures happen within the games as product placements and appear at different points within the gameplay as part of the environment.

Adi Cohen, VP Marketing of Cellcom, tells us:

“The digital coupons and product placement methods used in the trial have proven themselves with high conversion rate among our clients. The trial confirms also our view about the importance for the advertising to be an integral part of the content, and proves that when you offer the consumer very targeted and relevant campaigns, you get a high ROI for the advertisers.”

The campaigns were built by ad agencies using innerActive’s campaign management and personalisation tool InFlare. The dynamically inserted ads are targeted and segmented in real time according to user profiles, and can be prompted via user behaviour. The games themselves come from a variety of providers, including MobiltyZone. Eran Aviv, Joint MD of the company comments:

“There is no doubt that this kind of mobile based advertising service is a promising new channel for solid income for us.”