The Future of Mobile Advertising
The Future of Mobile Advertising: 3 Things You Need to Know
The future of mobile advertising isn’t decades down the line, it’s here today.
Mobile advertisements are continually evolving to fight for space and consumer attention. Set your mobile advertising strategy up for success by creating engaging content today.
Read on to learn more about the future of mobile advertising and how your business can stay ahead of the trends to capture consumer attention.
What Holds the Key to the Future of Mobile Advertising?
Decades ago, mobile advertising may have taken up a sliver of a business's marketing budget. Today, it’s a multi-billion dollar market.
With mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets now ubiquitous, the mobile advertising market is experiencing incredible growth. The team at Insider Intelligence recently reported that the U.S. mobile ad market will reach $168.88 billion in 2022, accounting for 67.9% of total digital ad spend. By 2026, it is predicted that mobile creative ad spend will reach $247.68 billion.
The growth in mobile advertising is, in large part, due to changing consumer habits. For many years, mobile devices were primarily used for communication or entertainment. Consumers would use their computers for online shopping, checking emails, and web surfing. Businesses adapted their digital marketing to reach their audiences on these online channels.
Flash forward a handful of years, and online behavior has drastically changed. Gallup performed some recent studies around this shift in how mobile users are interacting with their devices. In 2015, 11% of individuals used their smartphones more than their computers to make online purchases. Today, that number is 42%. There were also 23- to 25-point increases in Americans' reliance on smartphones for browsing the internet, comparing prices, and managing finances.
This means there are more opportunities than ever to invest in mobile advertising to connect with these mobile users in new ways. The future of mobile web advertising is promising, but it requires organizations to treat it as a separate, integral part of their digital marketing strategy.
42% of individuals use their smartphone vs computer to make a purchase
Benefits and Challenges of Mobile Advertising
Mobile marketing is one of the fastest-growing markets in the advertising industry. It undeniably has the potential to be a highly engaging and profitable channel for business, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to master.
Here are a handful of the benefits and challenges of mobile marketing to keep in mind.
Benefits of Mobile Advertising
Connect With More Consumers
For the majority of consumers, their mobile device is their lifeline. It’s how they communicate, shop, unwind, read the news, and work. A study from this year found that, on average, Americans check their phones 344 times per day. To further contextualize that, that’s once every 4 minutes.
Needless to say, mobile advertising allows businesses to reach a larger audience where they are the most - their smartphone.
Americans check their phone once every 4 minutes
Relevant Mobile Creative
Not only does mobile advertising help businesses cast a wider net, but it can also be tailored to different audiences based on factors such as their interests and online behavior. Contextual mobile web advertising allows businesses to connect with the right audiences at the right time.
Opportunities for Creative Campaigns
Mobile advertising also allows businesses and agencies to be more creative with their campaigns. Capturing consumer attention online is no small feat, so being strategic and creative to stand out among the noise is a must.
Developments in gamification advertising, augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR) mobile advertising are especially promising as we will cover in more detail shortly.
Challenges of Mobile Advertising
Fragmented Consumer Attention
Though consumers are spending more time than ever before on their smartphones, it’s increasingly difficult for advertisers to grab their attention. One of the most comprehensive studies on attention by Microsoft found that people have an attention span of a mere 8 seconds.
Yes, that’s less than the attention span of a goldfish.
While there are plenty of opportunities to place mobile ads in front of consumers, it’s up to advertisers to capitalize on these micro-moments rather than let them pass. Static banner ads simply won’t capture fragmented consumer attention, so marketers must be more creative.
Brand Safety and transparency
Where brands place their mobile ads matters–one study found that “67% of consumers are likely to engage with an ad on the website of a publisher they know and trust.”
Agencies can create brilliant mobile creative but, if it’s not placed on relevant and trusted websites, it will not perform. In other cases, running ads on sites with explicit content or with content that does not align with brand values can damage a brand’s reputation.
67% of consumers are likely to engage with an ad on the website of a publisher they know and trust.
The same study mentioned above found that more than half of consumers surveyed are more likely to engage with an ad when it is placed with relevant surrounding content. Contextual targeting can be challenging, especially for businesses that are new to mobile advertising. However, the payoff is having the right ads placed in front of the right audience at the right time leading to increased engagement.
That’s why Mobkoi only runs ads on premium sites in premium inventory. Going above and beyond the industry standard, Mobkoi offers full site-list transparency and granular reporting to every client to ensure brand safety and optimal performance for each campaign.
Privacy
The world of mobile advertising is always changing, but privacy and security concerns are always top of mind. It’s important for businesses and agencies to collect consumer data ethically to provide relevant mobile ad experiences.
For years, marketers relied on third-party cookies for cross-channel audience identification. These bite-sized pieces of data would be exchanged between advertisers and contain personal identifiers as consumers browse the web. Cookies have always been controversial due to the privacy concerns they raise.
This is why Google announced they would phase out the third-party cookie on Chrome browsers by 2024 (though this timeline can continue to change). In Google’s words, the decision to phase out cookies is to make the web more private and secure for users, while also supporting publishers.
What Does the Future of Mobile Marketing Look Like?
The future of mobile marketing is already happening. Here are a handful of the trends advertisers must capitalize on to connect with today’s consumers to turn them into tomorrow’s customers.
1. Content is King
In the future of mobile advertising, content is king. Static content no longer resonates with mobile users and small banner ads can be easily dismissed with the flick of a finger. Creative quality is important to today’s consumers, and if their high expectations aren’t met they simply won’t engage with the mobile ad presented to them.
The best way to break through the noise is by using interactive content that is relevant and engaging to your audience. For instance, a recent analysis of ads across MOBKOI’s client base revealed that mobile video ads with data-backed interactive capabilities achieve a 53% boost in engagement compared to standard video ads.
Luckily, modern technology makes creating engaging types of mobile advertising more accessible.
Gamification Advertising
The experts at Forbes summarize it best: Gamification makes ads more compelling. Essentially, gamification advertising replaces stagnant ads with interactive experiences that encourage (and often reward) participation.
These types of mobile ads are typically fun, branded games, like whack-a-mole and puzzles or finding a hidden object, or completing a scratch-off. This drives engagement and can lead to direct conversations, especially when rewards like coupons are given for participation. Time and time again, gamification advertising is shown to increase conversion rates compared to standard ads.
Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality Mobile Advertising
AR and VR are two other trends in mobile advertising. AR advertising or AR mobile advertising utilizes technology to superimpose a computer-generated image on a user's view of the real world, thus providing a composite view. It allows users to see how a piece of furniture would look in their space or how a watch would look on their wrist.
VR advertising or VR mobile advertising, on the other hand, creates a completely virtual, immersive experience for consumers. It can make for more interactive ad experiences and even allow consumers to interact with products in a virtual setting.
All of these types of mobile ads help generate attention and engagement, however, they are not always easy to implement. Relying on expert help is one of the best ways to implement cutting-edge mobile ads quickly and efficiently.
2. Context is Queen
With content as king, context is undoubtedly the queen. You simply can’t have one without the other. As we alluded to before, agencies can create amazing mobile advertising content, but if it’s irrelevant, it will not perform.
For example, you don’t want an advertisement for a luxury handbag appearing on a fast-fashion website. Similarly, an ad for female skin care shouldn’t be placed in an article for men’s grooming.
Contextual targeting is extremely important, and the need for relevant ad placement only grows with the deprecation of third-party cookies. Cookies will be obsolete in the near future, and they’re already falling out of fashion today. It’s essential that mobile marketers rely on contextual mobile advertising rather than third-party data to future-proof their media plans.
3. Eliminating Media Waste
Finally, it’s important to address trends in media waste. Too often, advertisers take the approach of quantity over quality for mobile advertising. They may run ads across many websites but overlook important factors such as context and, of course, ad placement.
Wasted ad spend is an area advertisers want to solve immediately, but may not know how. For instance, recent studies found that nearly two-thirds of location-targeting advertising spend may be wasted because of poor quality data and mistargeted location impressions. The same can be true for mobile advertisements that are placed on non-desirable websites or in front of the wrong audiences.
These instances, or when ads are poorly placed on a website, translate to wasted impressions. Eliminating wasted impressions requires securing premium mobile media placements and gaining full transparency into where ads are running.
Interscroller Mobile Ads
The placement of a mobile ad often dictates how the user will engage with it. A banner ad, for example, is easily overlooked even if it’s gamified. As is a static sidebar ad or mobile experience that becomes cut off as a user scrolls.
Consider utilizing interscroller ads. These ads reveal the content as the reader scrolls down a visited page. When the user scrolls to reveal 85% of the placement, the ad snaps to take over the entire screen and the user’s attention. While the user can simply scroll to dismiss the ad, it’s one of the best ways to place their full attention on the creative.
Advertisers can eliminate wasted media spend by focusing on premium inventory. Invest in ad formats that are full-screen and unmissable without being overwhelming. This shift is already being seen in the media industry with publishers prioritizing the user experience. According to Bloomberg, “more publishers recognize the need to design their websites to prioritize readers, rather than over-stuff pages full of ad slots, if they hope to generate reader revenue.”
Preparing Your Business for the Future of Mobile Advertising
It’s never too early - or too late - to begin future-proofing your mobile advertising efforts. To appeal to mobile users today and tomorrow, it’s essential to tap into the mobile consumer and contextual advertising expertise.
Most mobile web advertising efforts fall flat because they fail to take a holistic approach to mobile ads. By focusing on just content, ad placement, or engagement, you’re not creating a premium mobile ad experience that consumers want to interact with.
At Mobkoi, we know what it takes to create attention-grabbing and engaging mobile ad campaigns. The combination of innovative creative, premium inventory, and contextual targeting put interactive ads on premium sites consumers can’t miss.
Make sure your mobile advertisements stand the test of time.
Get in touch with the team at Mobkoi today to learn more about enhancing your mobile advertising strategy for tomorrow.
