PITTSBURGH – Wizzard Media (NYSE Amex: WZE), the world’s leading podcasting network, announced support for AdMob, Google’s Mobile Ad network. Additionally, Wizzard announced nearly 30 audio and video content based Apps, available now in the Android Marketplace. The newly launched Android Apps include some of Wizzard’s best selling Apps from Apple’s App Store and represent 9.2 million media downloads last month. Joining other familiar Wizzard Media Network names Steve Dahl, Grammar Girl and Zig Ziglar, is new comer 1938 Media. Loren Feldman of 1938 Media is a notable social media and featured video blogger at The Huffington Post, making his debut in the Android Marketplace.
Google’s AdMob is now live, serving ads, on The Steve Dahl Show Android App. AdMob is the largest mobile advertising network with over 300 billion global impressions. The latest Android version of Wizzard’s App adds the popular iPhone App feature, audio playback, with full background and multitasking support. The combination of the features will allow for an elegant and improved user experience that encourages interaction with the App and the ability for consumers to navigate to advertiser sites from within the App due to the interactive capabilities.
According to Millennial Media, ad impressions for Android devices tied Apple’s iOS for the first time last month as each claimed 37 percent of the U.S. market based on revenue.
The Android smartphone continues to grow in popularity, outselling its closest rival, Apple’s iPhone, by a nearly two-to-one margin in the third quarter of 2010 as reported by NPD, a market research firm. Additionally, NPD reported that Android, Google’s mobile operating system, was installed on 44% of all smartphones sold in the US. Wizzard Management believes that expanded support for the Android platform will drive increased consumption and new audiences. Android’s popularity and growth can be attributed to the variety of devices offered, from the high-end corporate-like devices to the medium-range consumer devices, across various carriers.
Wizzard aims to convert the 700 Apps it currently offers through Apple’s App Store to also be available in the Android Marketplace over the next month, in time for the post Christmas sales jump from the surge in new devices hitting the market. The standard base-price for Wizzard’s App for Android will be $1.99, with additional features, paid in-App upgrades and ongoing subscription packages offered in the near future. Revenue from downloadable mobile Apps is predicted to surge from $6.8 billion worldwide this year to $29.5 billion by 2013, according to the research firm Gartner Inc.
The latest Wizzard Apps now live in the Android Marketplace include: 1938 Media, 58% Geek Podcast App, A WindowtotheMagic, Anime Pulse – News and Reviews, Are We Alone, BEST OF THE LEFT, Books and Ideas, Brain Burps About Books, Brain Science App, Duct Tape Marketing, Filmspotting – movie reviews+, Gamertag Radio App, Grammar Girl – Podcast App, Inspire Podcast – Zig Ziglar, Jim Harold’s Campfire, Motion Traxx Radio, Paranormal Podcast, Photography 101, Pod F. Tompkast, Skepticality– Skeptic Magazine, Smart Mouths, Spanish 2 Go, The Cell Phone Junkie, The History of Rome, The Murverse, The New Republic, The Paranormal Report, The Steve Dahl Show, IBDeditorials Daily Podcast, Low Budget FM – Comedy Podcast, Meditation Oasis.
“We continue to extend our mobile media monetization efforts for our podcast publishers with the addition of Google’s AdMob for Android Apps. The expansion to the Android platform has been well-received by our network and we believe it will continue to attract new customers to our service,” says Chris Spencer, Wizzard Media CEO. “This is a natural progression in Wizzard’s strategy to become the leading mobile content distribution and monetization service. Our service provides serious mobile content publishers with state-of-the-art distribution services, unique monetization solutions and compelling audience engagement experiences that are extendible to future platforms.”
About Wizzard Media:
Wizzard Media provides podcast publishers with distribution and monetization services. Our clients include Microsoft, National Geographic, Harvard Business Review, Usher, NPR and more than 16,700 others who use Wizzard Media products to measure their podcast audience, deliver popular audio and video entertainment and monetize their content through advertising and App sales. In 2009, the Wizzard Media Network received over 1.4 billion podcast requests from approximately 50 million people worldwide through iPods, iPhones, iPads, iTunes, Blackberrys, Zunes and many other devices and destinations. We are part of a publicly held, Pittsburgh based company with thousands of shareholders and a world-class team. Visit us on the web at www.wizzardsoftware.com/media, email us at [email protected].
