So, we have been hearing for a long time that mobile advertising will take off in the U.S., maybe this is the beginning.  In a recent Business Week article, Tom Lowry explorers the recent success of brands using Pandora as a mobile advertising medium. 

There are a number of pros that provide foundation for this argument including the sales growth of smartphone and the success of the iphone and its web applications.  The mobile phone will offer unmatched customer engagment.  Marketers will have the ability to truly market where you are and when you want it.

Since it's lanuch nine years ago and the launch of its mobile application two years ago Pandora has signed up 6 million people (total users for mobile and Web versions is 27 million). That has prompted the likes of Best Buy (BBY), Dockers, Target (TGT), and Nike (NKE) to buy ads on Pandora and experiment with what remains a cheap advertising medium—one most companies have yet to figure out. 

Pandora has become a test bed because people who use the service tend to spend a lot of time playing around with it. They are constantly creating stations, rating songs, and scrolling through playlists to find artists they don't know. Pandora founder Tim Westergren says on average subscribers use the mobile service about 90 minutes a day (though there are no independent numbers). - WOW

HIGH CUSTOMER RESPONSE

If one thing has surprised advertisers, it's how avidly consumers are responding. Target says 27% more people clicked on its ad for the release of Christina Aguilera's greatest hits CD last fall than on any other mobile Web campaign. The ad urged users to visit a site where they could get a free Aguilera ringtone and buy the album. Target recently launched a Pandora campaign for the retailer's C9 by Champion clothing line.

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