The Mobile Marketing Association announced its 2009 North American Board of Directors today. New to the board this year are: The Nielsen Co.‘s Julia Resnick, VP of mobile media solutions; Millennial Media president/CEO Paul Palmieri; Sprint-Nextel’s Lisa-Anne Uhrmacher, GM of mobile advertising; Verizon‘s Richard Williams, executive director, Digital Media Operations; Vibes Media president Jack Philbin; and Yahoo‘s David Katz, VP of mobile advertising and publisher services.
The MMA Board of Directors provides leadership and strategic guidance for the association. Mike Wehrs, CEO and president of the MMA, said this year’s board brings some more senior executives, noting the increasing attention the channel is getting from businesses.
“The number of brands using mobile marketing and the complexity of the campaigns they are running is increasing,” Wehrs said. “Brands have realized that this is a powerful medium.”
Brand education was a critical component on the agency’s agenda, according to Wehrs. The MMA maintains and circulates Consumer Best Practices and Global Mobile Advertising Guidelines to the industry. Wehrs said that a huge hurdle in mobile campaigns had been time-consuming testing and compliance when each marketer had to follow a variety of separate guidelines from a number of carriers. Wehr said that progress has been made to “reduce friction” and consolidate each carrier’s compliance codes, “but we haven’t declared this problem solved and disbanded the group – there’s a lot more to be done,” he quipped.
One area that the MMA seeks to be proactive in is advocating for mobile marketers rights and communicating the needs of the industry to the government. The MMA is voluntarily briefing the Federal Trade Commission after each of its public meetings and allowing the agency to comment on its members best practices.
Returning to the Board of Directors from 2008 are:
• Michael Becker, VP, mobile strategies, iLoop Mobile Inc.
• Jordan Berman, executive director, media innovation, AT&T – Converged Services
• Tom Daly, group manager, strategy and planning, The Coca-Cola Company
• Venetia Espinoza, group manager, mobile applications and partner programs, T-Mobile USA
• Jeffrey Glass, partner, Bain Capital Ventures
• Louis Gump, VP, mobile, The Weather Channel Interactive
• Nick MacIlveen, senior director, strategic corporate development and industry relations, OpenMarket
• Maria Mandel, senior partner – executive director, digital innovation, Ogilvy
• David Oberholzer, VP, corporate development, Brightkite
• Diana Pouliot, director, mobile advertising, Google
