AdMobilize And Verizon Partner To Monitor Ads In The Real World

AdMobilize, a new monitoring and tracking technology that measures attention and traffic in stores and for outdoor advertising, is partnering with Verizon* to add 3G connectivity to its outdoor beacons.

In July, the Miami-based company announced the second version of its AdBeacon product, a way to measure ad performance in the physical world. At the time the company managed to round up $1.6 million in financing from undisclosed investors.

Now, according to Rodolfo Saccoman, the company’s chief executive, AdMobilize is ready to further improve on its services through the use of Verizon’s networking technologies. Admobilize is also getting a sales boost through the partnership, with Verizon’s sales team pitching AdMobilize’s technology to its customers.

The company’s pitch is that it can do for outdoor advertising what Google Analytics did online. Through a combination of scanning and imaging technologies the company can find out information about traffic flow and demographics that other beacons cannot capture, according to Saccoman.

Creepily, the technology can track things like “dwell time”, “gaze ratio”, demographics… and emotions. But, don’t fear, gentle reader, the company isn’t tracking individuals… yet.

“Where this gets interesting is to provide the message to the audience. When you think of expanding your product reach to the masses and to the physical environment… for you to make that happen in a way that works you need a partnership with a carrier,” says Saccoman. “You have to do that with a carrier that’s going to make this happen,”

The initial customers for the combined Verizon and AdMobilize effort will be billboard operators, says Saccoman. That market is roughly $7 billion, and by monitoring their impressions, Saccoman says display advertisers can draw money back from advertisers focused on television, radio, and the Internet.

Not only does AdMobilize track people’s generic reactions to advertising, but the company will now also track vehicles, looking for things like color, model, speed, and traffic by an ad during peak hours. “We do have some things in our product development with the ability to integrate to third-party data sets related to transportation,” adds Saccoman.

*Verizon owns AOL, which owns TechCrunch, which pays my bills.Â