Mobile Advertising
Advertisers have yet to catch up on mobile devices, considering the time it takes for people to use the latter. William Iven/Unsplash

Mobile advertising is experiencing unprecedented growth across the globe, according to reports. Mary Meeker has even predicted that internet ad revenues would surpass TV advertising in 2017 and that this would be a global trend. Here are the reasons why global mobile advertising is trending.

Global trends

More than half of online searches worldwide are made using mobile devices. Those using the internet for the first time are most likely relying on a mobile device because they may not be able to afford a PC.

American mobile ad spending rose by three quarters in 2016. Smaller companies can easily take advantage of mobile ads, especially local ones targeted toward consumers within their vicinity. Google and Facebook, for instance, accounted for nearly 90% of advertising revenue growth in the US in 2016. They achieved this by positioning ads within their social media platforms on mobile devices.

Snapchat users, meanwhile, spend about half an hour per day using the app. As a result, the company saw an estimated six hundred million in ad revenue in 2016. Its effective strategies include building brand awareness, allowing small businesses to showcase their products to new audiences and marketing peer-to-peer without explicitly paying for an ad.

Mobile ads won’t entirely eliminate desktop ads, since most American consumers shop online using their PCs. In 2016, a fifth of ecommerce sales took place on mobile devices. Interestingly, the share of sales via information appliances is growing, so conversational search engine optimisation, in which you can sell to consumers using Alexa or Siri, is expected to grow. Advertising, however, will remain a challenge to them.

Asia still a leader

China is at the forefront of mobile ad growth globally, while other Asia-Pacific countries are right behind it. At the start of 2017, China witnessed 18% higher ad revenue, mostly achieved via weather and sports apps.

In India, mobile users spend half their time using entertainment apps on mobile devices, searching for information, sending messages to their contacts and using social media. Entrepreneur Gurbaksh Chahal expects to see mobile video consumption replacing TV consumption for many users thanks to these entertainment apps. Chahal had launched his first two online advertising companies by the time he was 26 years old. One of these companies was acquired by Yahoo! for $300 million. He also launched the world's first cloud marketing platform, Gravity4, and has had a finger on the pulse of the industry for many years.

The heavy use of mobile devices and its sheer market size – 400 million users and more – resulted to an increase in mobile spending in India. Since data prices dropped by 50% in 2016, advertising is expected to expand as mobile users now afford more time online. This is further facilitated by apps designed to increase engagement with those with 2G and 3G connections, not to mention those using lite apps like that of YouTube, which recently rolled out in India. Gurbaksh Chahal believes that mobile advertising through these platforms will mirror the standard 30-second spots on TV.

Mobile advertising Australian trends

The amount of time people spend on mobile devices compared to PCs is growing. American users spend over three hours a day on a mobile device versus two to two-and-a-half hours on a computer. In Australia, mobile devices account for the majority of digital consumption; Australians spend two thirds of their time on smartphones versus a third on traditional PCs. Online and mobile video spending even increased by 50% in Australia in 2016.

Australian mobile ad spending increased by 30% in the first quarter of 2017, while overall online spending was up by 7%. Mobile spending surpassed the fifty percent mark of display advertising expenditures in 2016. This is an increase from the 22% in 2014.

Conclusion

The sheer number of people switching to mobile devices for media consumption is only matched by the time spent on mobile devices compared to personal computers. Advertisers have yet to catch up on mobile devices, considering the time it takes for people to use the latter. However, China is witnessing a serious growth in in-app advertising, while India is experiencing an online marketing take-off as bandwidth increases and prices drop.