Under FreeBee DaTa 360, content providers can sign up provide users with mobile video and other content – whether delivered in an app or a mobile Web site, without eating into the consumer’s data plans, Verizon said. FreeBee Data 360 lets a content provider, such as a news service, sponsor some or all of the mobile data a subscriber uses to access that content. The sponsorship can include a website, app, or both, with content providers paying by the gigabyte.
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Verizon Wireless, like AT&T before it, is now charging online content providers a fee to get their services exempted from customers’ data caps. Under the FreeBee Data 360 model content providers can sign up to provide users with some or all of their mobile content, regardless of whether it’s in an app or on a mobile website, free without having it count against the user’s data allowance.
Sponsors will also have access to a customizable dashboard to help them track the performance of their campaign through analytics.
The pay-per-click offering is a little further off. Verizon plans to kick off a limited beta program with about 1,000 test subscribers starting on Monday, January 25.
“In today’s digital economy, FreeBee Data is a departure from the one size fits all approach to marketing”, explained Colson Hillier, VP for consumer products at Verizon. Verizon said reporting tools will include a feature that allows sponsors to track clicks on individual links to see where customers are responding to their FreeBee Data offers. I know that T-Mobile has been given a green light to do it and that there is nothing wrong with the practice but it feels like a slippery slope to me. This is eliminating the competition unfairly in my opinion just because Pandora – in this fictional example - chose to pay extra to your carrier so they won’t charge you. In this instance, companies pay Verizon on a per click basis. I miss the days of unlimited data but at least I am only paying for what data I use now.
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Verizon became the second USA wireless carrier to offer sponsored data on Tuesday, with the introduction of its FreeBee Data service.
