• by Tobi Elkin  @tobielkin, February 15, 2017

The findings of a new three-part study analyzing publishers’ readiness for mobile growth, reveal that in-house teams lack skills related to HTML5 and critical support from mobile partners vs. display advertising partners.

The study of more than 40 of global publishers conducted by The 614 Group sought to address such questions as: How do mobile publishers and advertisers navigate mobile advertising? How do they determine which ad-tech partners are right for them? And, what role do publishers expect ad-tech partners to play?

The first part of the study looked at publishers’ mobile readiness.  Among the findings:

--50% of publishers’ trafficking workload, measured in lines per day, is in mobile. However, only 25% of the in-house teams possess HTML5 skills, a skills gap publishers will need to bridge in order to remain competitive.

--50% of publishers use two or fewer mobile partners vs. their display advertising business.

--Viewability in mobile hasn’t yet emerged as a strong buying criteria. Over 72% of publishers surveyed stated 24% or less of their campaigns require viewability guarantees. And only 15% said at least half of their campaigns require it.

The second study focused on developing a knowledge base of mobile-monetization partners for the market at large. The findings were derived from in-depth interviews with five of the largest mobile monetization companies: AerServ, AppNexus, OpenX, PubMatic, and Rubicon Project. The goal was to help publishers choose the right partner to help them build their mobile monetization strategies. Among the findings:

--Ad blocking at this point appears to be a non-issue in mobile ad tech. Despite reports that found 25% of mobile devices have ad-blocking software installed on them, none of the mobile ad-tech providers interviewed felt that ad blocking has had a significant impact on their business.

--Mobile app CPMs are below publisher expectations. Mobile app publishers are disappointed in the CPMs paid for inventory. The low yields on inventory may be due to a number of factors, some of which the publishers themselves control. For example, many publishers continue to use desktop strategies in mobile (PubMatic), or think of monetization on a cost per install basis (CPI), but are looking for returns on ads in a CPM.  For a marketer, the disparity in being able to measure success across these two metrics leaves a gap, and prevents the ability to create pricing parity.

--Brand safety remains a high-level concern. Some industry estimates put mobile app fraud costs as high as $350 million a year. The study found that mobile ad-tech partners’ strategy for ensuring brand safety is a critical consideration. Ad-tech providers are implementing multi-pronged approaches to this issue.

The third part of the study addressed mobile monetization. Among the findings:

--Header bidding has arrived in mobile. Exchanges have implemented header bidding solutions for mobile inventory (mobile Web and mobile apps).

--Simplified relationships between publishers and SDKs (software development kits) are slowly emerging. More refined solutions showing how exchanges interact with a publisher's SDK or API (application protocol interface) bundles are forthcoming. Companies such as AppNexus have built simplified solutions that allow for fewer API calls and limit the complicated process of SDK changes.

--Curating demand is table stakes. Mobile monetization firms believe they should invest time and resources into curating and managing their demand partners. Publishers need to consider this when making a decisions on which technology providers they choose as partners.

Among the publishers that participated in the research: Condé Nast, Thomson Reuters, The Weather Company, AccuWeather, and Beliefnet.

“Publishers need to see the opportunity in mobile and have to keep working to increase competition for their mobile inventory, which will consequently boost their mobile CPMs,” stated Rob Rasko, CEO of The 614 Group. “They’ve invested time and resources to analyze and test demand partners for their desktop inventory, and have extensive ecosystems in place to drive yield. Going forward, they need to put the same effort into their mobile infrastructure and inventory, since that is where consumers spend their time.”