Will D2C drive mass market content consumption?

Some readers took issue with my column [1] last week when I commended Motricity for getting back to basics and eliminating some of its businesses that weren't working. Specifically, I said that "It's time to stop investing in things that aren't working (direct to consumer) and focus on the basics."

That statement didn't sit well with Anil Malhotra, senior vice president of marketing and alliances at Bango, which of course is a big player in the direct-to-consumer market. Malhotra wrote to me saying that mobile content does not have to be complicated and companies such as Motricity are creating unnecessary obstacles and slowing down mobile content adoption. He believes D2C is the model that will drive mass market distribution.

I'll admit I'm still quite skeptical about the direct-to-consumer business. For the past couple of years I've heard from hundreds of small D2C companies that thought the mobile web was the same as the wired web, and assured me that they had a fool-proof moneymaking proposition. Many of those firms are no longer around or have been acquired.

What many D2C players didn't count on was the high barrier to entry that they faced.  These small companies weren't "household" names so they had little visibility with the consumer and had to spend big marketing dollars to get consumer awareness of their content offerings and promote certain short codes. Plus their delivery mechanism usually consisted of pushing out their content via an SMS message, which meant more costs to the consumer and the content firm.

But Malhotra says that this scenario is finally changing. He says that the mobile web has evolved and now D2C content companies can use search engine optimization and other traditional web marketing techniques to capture mobile web traffic. This means that consumers can find the content that they want and D2C firms don't have to spend millions on marketing short codes. Nor do they have to rely so heavily on SMS as their delivery mechanism. With improved web browsing, consumers can find the content and download it.

I think Malhotra makes some valid points. The mobile web is making off-portal content more compelling to consumers. But I'm not sure I agree that direct-to-consumer will be the primary driver of mass market content consumption. I would love to hear your views on this topic. -Sue [2]