Next Year Will Be The 'Year Of' Mobile: For Video, Anyway

As far as media consumption milestones go, 2016 could well be “the year” for two important media: mobile and video. According to new estimates released this morning by Publicis’ ZenithOptimedia unit, next year will be the year that more people watch video on a mobile device than a non-mobile device.

The milestone is significant, the agency’s analysts say, because online video itself is one of the fastest-growing media and is on the verge of disrupting an even more dominant video consumption platform: television. While worldwide television consumption has continued to expand despite the onslaught of new digital media options -- especially video ones -- ZenithOptimedia forecasts the accelerated adoption of digital video consumption will finally begin to take negatively impact linear TV viewing next year.

The agency predicts the number of people watching conventional linear TV will peak this year and will decline for the first time in 2016, largely due to consumer adoption of digital video options -- especially mobile.

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“We forecast that the number of regular linear TV viewers will rise 3.1% in 2015 but then shrink by 1.9% in 2016 and 0.9% in 2017,” the report asserts, adding that “the amount of time people spent watching linear TV has been in slow decline for several years [and] we now predict that next year the number of viewers to start to decline as well.”

Not surprisingly, the report also predicts that ad spending will begin to follow suit and online video will begin taking share away from traditional TV ad budgets.

“Advertising expenditures on online video will soon account for an eighth of total Internet ad spending,” the report predicts, estimating it will reach $16.1 billion worldwide this year and will expand to $23.7 billion in 2017.

In the U.S., the world’s biggest and most developed advertising marketplace, online video currently represents about half the worldwide online video ad marketplace: $8.5 billion.

2 comments about "Next Year Will Be The 'Year Of' Mobile: For Video, Anyway".
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  1. Ed Papazian from Media Dynamics Inc, July 31, 2015 at 1:10 p.m.

    It's always a bit misleading to cite what amount to reach estimates---like how many peoiple watch "linear TV" on a "regular" basis, when the real issue is how often everyone views. It's clear, even from Nielsen, that the amount of time people devote to "linear TV ", and especially, live TV, is declining and has been dropping for a number of years. The same reservation applies to digital video consumption. Also, it's not a given that ad dollars will flow to mobile in proportion to the amount of time people spend viewing videos on such devices ----as some assume. There's the little matter of ad visibility and impact on mobile's small screens as well as the fact that we don't really have a handle on whether or nor a TV ad on mobile functions in the same manner--attention getting- or message registration-wise as on other platforms.

  2. dorothy higgins from Mediabrands WW, August 3, 2015 at noon

    What is online video in this report? Is it the numerous 60 second cat videos I'm watching on my FB news feed on my iphone? Is it a PBS program I am streaming through my ipad through to my Apple TV to my 60" screen? Is it House of Cards on my ipad? This is the type of reporting that drives me nuts. I simply have no idea what it is REALLY telling me about people's media consumption patterns.  Feh

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