Coming on the heals of MTV's $50 million infusion into new MVNO Amp'd Mobile, Virgin Mobile USA, said it has renewed its original deal with MTV to include an exclusive mobile sponsorship for Total Request Live and Direct Effect. Each show will showcase exclusive mobile content sponsored by Virgin. MTV will also build special WAP-based microsites for Virgin customers to access exclusive graphics, games, alerts and sweepstakes entries. MTV and Amp'd on the other hand are planning to develop joint marketing and promotions across MTV's brands and advertising channels, and Amp'd is offering repurposed and exclusive made-for-mobile content from MTV.
As MVNOs and operators focus their offerings heavily on data, operators believe exclusive content will be the key differentiator. It will be impossible for operators to have a truly exclusive relationship with a content player, however, since media players want their content on as many phone screens as possible. Instead we're seeing large content brands make "exclusive" deals with operators but farm out different packages to other operators. Exclusive deals might not be so exclusive after all.
More more on Virgin Mobile's deal with MTV:
- check out this press release from Virgin Mobile