When Allan Kent roamed into our office a short while ago, and started playing darts with Tim, I pounced on him to organise an interview.

He’s currently the head of AtPlay, the digital division of Saatchi & Saatchi, and has been described as a trans-media storyteller and creative genius. He’s a quirky guy, who kindly offered to carve his email address into my arm with a dart when I asked him for the interview. He’s also really not as scary as that makes him sound.

Being so experienced in mobile marketing, an area that’s increasingly important and filled with potential, we thought it would be valuable to ask him a few questions about that and the release of the iPhone 2.0, as well as his experience with @Play. Enjoy!

On the iPhone:

Are you a stand in line all night, beat people away from the counter iPhone enthusiast?  If so, why?

I thought I might be, but after the delirium that accompanies a Steve Jobs announcement cleared, and I came to my senses, I doubt that I will be getting an iPhone.

Is the iPhone 3G really a revolution?

Here’s a great sitting on the fence answer: yes and no. The problem that I have with the iPhone is that the underlying technology is not all that cutting edge. 2MP camera and 3G are a bit dated now. GPS is nice, but I wonder how it will work here - without a decent data set the routing would be a bit of a bust. I don’t know what data set they have though, so it might be just fine. What Apple always seem to get right though, and I guess this is why people will stand in line to buy the thing, is the interface. I have an iPod Touch and the interface is slick.

What phone(s) do you have currently, what apps have you installed on your phone and what are the top 3 most used?

Too embarrassing. I have an LG Chocolate. It seemed like a cool phone when I got it 2 years ago but now I can’t wait to get rid of it. I did get one of those HTC things but I hated the phone interface on it, so it’s lying in a drawer somewhere. Phones need to be able to make calls, which is another reason I am skeptical about the iPhone. First and foremost the phone functionality needs to be easy to get it - don’t make me work to use a device for the purpose it was intended.

I only have 2 apps installed on my phone, simply because nothing else will work on it. Mxit, which I never really use any more and Opera Mini, the only way to browse the web on your mobile. Unless you have Safari on the iPhone of course :P

What opportunities does the iPhone specifically present for companies wanting to engage with mobile?

The most important thing that I mentioned earlier is that I believe the iPhone interface will make mobile applications a lot more accessible to people. I think that at the moment you either need to have a bit of technical savvy to browse the web on your phone, or have your kid show you what to do. It’s not always intuitive what you need to do or how to navigate around, so it does put a lot of people off. The iPhone is going to make that barrier completely disappear.

This can only be a good thing for companies wanting to engage in mobile - not only will there be more people browsing the web through their mobile devices, but with Safari they will have a far richer experience because of it. This is fine if you are developing web based applications or marketing but the other side of the coin is developing native iPhone apps. You need to be a registered Apple developer and pay to be able to submit your application. I believe that even then there is a vetting process on which 3rd party apps are allowed and not.

On the mobile Web:

There have been reports that South Africa is 3rd in the queue for getting the iPhone, does this mean that big players in mobile see Africa as an important space in terms of the mobile web and what can this mean for us?

Yes. Africa is a huge mobile opportunity. Just look at the size of markets like Nigeria or Ghana and also what they are already doing on mobile phones.

How tough is it to convince clients they need to get involved with the mobile web?

With everything it comes down to budgets and accountability. How much money are we allocating to this and what is the return on that investment. We need to be realistic about the number of people that are currently browsing the web through their mobile phones and the level of engagement that we will get from them. It’s not that difficult to get a pilot project off the ground and then track it to see how it goes.

One of our readers questioned whether there is an existing demand for mobile search in South Africa or if we’d have to create one, do you have any thoughts on this?

I’m not sure whether there is an existing demand for mobile search as of yet, but it makes sense that there should be and that that search would be a different kind of beast. If you look at the context in which we would search for something on the web as against to what we would be searching for if we were using our mobile phones. My mobile is always with me, so when I fire up Opera Mini to search for something on my phone, it’s usually because I’ve seen something specific to where I am and what I am doing, not because I’m looking for something to pass the time.

The great potential with mobile is that it’s such a personal space to reach people in. How big is the risk that consumers could just get really pissed off at being invaded on their mobiles and how do you avoid that?

Context and content. Yes it’s a personal space but if what we’re showing them is relevant and interesting there’s no reason that it should be seen as an intrusion. Getting an SMS about a sale I won’t ever attend at 3AM in the morning is an intrusion yes, but providing me with something relevant in the context that is useful to me is a different matter entirely.

For Allan's answers on being the head of AtPlay watch out for the second half of the interview later today.