News

Mobile marketing event postponed in the Philippines, elections blamed

MMA ForumA two-day mobile event in the Philippines has been postponed.

Mobile Marketing Forum 2016, which was scheduled for 23-24 June with the theme ‘Reimagining Marketing’, has been pushed back to later in the year.

The event organiser, Singapore-based All Events Group, said that Mobile Marketing Forum was postponed due to the recent national elections, which were held on 9 May. However sources suggest the event had not gained sufficient traction with the industry.

The forum, priced at PHP30,000 (US$640), had online ad firm Digimatic Group as a gold sponsor but no confirmed speakers.

The new dates for the two-day event are 28-29 November.

The Mobile Marketing Forum in the Philippines shares the same name as the format started by the Mobile Marketing Association, and Mumbrella understands that MMA has objected to the use of the name by All Events Group.

MMA launched the first Mobile Marketing Forum in APAC in 2007, and has since expanded to include local incarnations where mobile is gaining increasing value as a tool for marketers.

MMA Forum Singapore is slated for 5 August, MMA Forum Indonesia for 1 September, the China event for a fortnight later and MMA Forum India for 7 October.

The industry has been faced with a high number of digital events in Asia, with some, such as Social Media Matters and Ad:tech Asean, withdrawing from the market.

Festival of Media Asia also recently scaled back, scrapping the conference and focusing on its awards.

Jasper Donat, head of one of the region’s leading marketing event groups Branded, told Mumbrella in an interview last year: “I think there are too many events full stop. It’s spoiling the market.”

“It means that there is too much choice, and that can’t be a good thing. There are a lot of digital media events out there, and a few that are great but a lot are not cutting through,” he commented.

While some digital events have waned, others such as Exchangewire’s ATS have expanded by focusing on programmatic, the fastest growing part of the digital marketing sector.

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