SONATA, the first global mobile advertising solution focused entirely on driving real foot traffic to traditional brick-and-mortar businesses, today announced the launch of its first U.S. office in New York City.
Simultaneous with the company's U.S. launch, Sonata has named digital media and mobile veteran Evan Krauss as its Chief Operating Officer, based out of New York City. Krauss will oversee Sonata's U.S. operations reporting directly to Sonata CEO and founder, Alvaro del Castillo. Sonata has already achieved success in the European market, and the company is committed to bringing its winning approach to the U.S. market.
"Evan has extensive experience, market know-how, and vision in growing, championing, and developing successful digital businesses in the U.S. and abroad," said Alvaro del Castillo, CEO and founder of Sonata. "We are thrilled to have him on our team, and are confident in his ability to lead Sonata's launch and successful expansion in the U.S. market."
Built by former retailers, Sonata enables stores, restaurants, theaters and dealerships, large and small, anywhere in the world to bring real and measurable foot traffic directly to their points of sale. The Sonata platform offers access to over 100 billion monthly impressions, and is a real-time bidding (RTB) marketplace where customers bid on specific events, such as click-to-call, click-to-map, or redeem an offer in geo-fenced zones from 100 yards to 10 miles. Retailers pay only for results, making Sonata a cost-effective, zero risk mobile advertising solution that drives real foot traffic and revenue to traditional brick-and-mortar businesses.
Mr. Krauss has worked in the digital space since 1995, starting with agency.com. He previously worked to develop new products and businesses for companies including Excite, AOL, Yahoo!, and Jumptap. Most recently, he held the role of Executive Vice President of Global Advertising Sales at Shazam, where he led the creation of Shazam's very successful second screen advertising business.
"Local has long been touted as the key value proposition of mobile advertising because it can leverage digital advertising technologies to deliver in the moment ads that drive real consumers foot traffic," said Krauss. "However, it is only over the last year that we have enough scale and efficiency in the market to bring local mobile advertising to life in a real way. My first order of business is to quickly hire the best talent to serve our partner and customer needs in the U.S.."
According to a recent forecast from BIA/Kelsey, mobile will be the fastest-growing channel in the local advertising media market, rising from 1.7 percent share of local ad revenues in 2013 to 7.1 percent share in 2017. By then, mobile local ad spend will have grown to $10.8 billion representing 52 percent of all mobile advertising spending - about one billion more than would be spent on non-location targeted ads ($9.9 billion).
