Internet ad spending grew 22% in 2011 to $31.7 billion, according to the latest data from the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers. That growth rate tops last year’s 14.5%, indicating that digital advertising continues to ramp up after a recession-induced setback in 2009. For the fourth quarter of 2011, online ad spending hit nearly $9 billion -- up 20.4% from a year ago, and 14.7% from the third quarter. The IAB said mobile advertising -- which it began tracking in 2010 for the first time -- was the fastest-growing category in 2011, jumping 149% to $1.6 billion from $641 million in 2010. Mobile also doubled from 2.5% to 5% of total online ad dollars this year. Digital video advertising -- which the IAB includes as part of display advertising -- saw strong growth as well, rising 29% from $1.4 billion to $1.8 billion. Overall, display spending rose 15% in 2011 from $9.6 billion to $11.1 billion. Search advertising enjoyed even bigger gains, growing 27% from $11.7 billion to $14.8 billion. It continued to make up the largest proportion of online ad spend: at 46.5%, up from 44.8% in 2010. That increase came at the expense of display, which declined from 37% in 2010 to 34.8% last year. Retail advertisers remains the largest category of Internet ad spending, accounting for 22% in 2011, or $7.1 billion, up slightly from 21% ($5.5 billion). Financial services accounted for 13% ($4.1 billion), telecom, 12% ($3.9 billion), automotive, 11% ($2.9 billion), leisure travel, 8% ($2.4 billion), and computing 8% ($2.7 billion). Those proportions all held fairly steady through 2011, varying only by a percentage point here and there. Fueled by search and mobile spending, performance-based advertising gained ground in 2011, accounting for nearly 65% of total online ad dollars, up from 62% in 2010. CPM-based advertising dipped slightly from 33% to 31.3%, while dollars going to hybrid-priced models also declined from 4.8% to 4.2%. By its reckoning, the IAB said the $31.7 billion in Internet advertising in 2011 eclipsed the $31 billion in cable TV advertising last year, making the category second only to broadcast TV ($38.5 billion). “Pushing past the $30 billion barrier, the interactive advertising industry confirms its central place in media," said IAB President and CEO Randall Rothenberg, in announcing the 2011 figures Wednesday.
Television media buyers who are familiar with gross rating point metrics -- but struggling to understand digital measurements -- now have tools from Google that bring the familiarity of measuring offline campaigns online. Google's Active GRP and Active View integrate into the DoubleClick for Advertisers ad-serving platform used by publishers and marketers. The company launched a pilot program as a first step. Google hopes that Active GRP, a GRP metric modeled on TV advertising measurements, will become the standard for online advertising. A Google spokesperson noted: "It's a tough technology puzzle to solve." Active GRP, the counterpart to traditional rating metrics, relies on a statistical model that combines aggregate panel data and anonymous user data, either inferred or user-provided, which occurs when people voluntarily join user panels. Calculations determine a marketer's reach with each online buy. The tool serves up information on measurements from a variety of media, such as mobile, display, and video. Marketers can take immediate action on the measurements viewed in a dashboard. Google will likely make offline GRP metrics available in the dashboard, because it follows the company's focus to give marketers the ability to compare offline and online campaigns and data. The Google spokesperson declined to comment on future features. The Active GRP tool integrates with another product Google, Active View, which measures viewed impressions. Through a tag in the ad creative piece, the Active View technology can tell Google's platform whether at least 50% of the ad has been in view on a Web page for at least one second. After ads serve up and render on the publisher's page, for example, Active View measures the ad unit position and browser dimension. It also registers any events that might change the layout of the page, and what the ad industry calls "viewability." Active View metrics, such as the percentage of the ads inside the browser viewport and corresponding duration, are measured. Active View will roll out in the coming weeks in the Google Display Network Reserve, which supports targeting relevant content channels, timing and advanced targeting, such as geographic, demographic and above the fold. It claims to help advertisers keep track of the services and products received for money invested in campaigns. In the past, brands might have known the ads were served, but did not understand if the ads were viewed. Google is not the only company that launched a viewability service this week. AdSafe Media also introduced a similar service. The company's CEO, Scott Knoll, said the technology blocks between 3% and 7% of the nearly 2 billion ads served daily from serving up next to inappropriate content. It can also tell advertisers when someone viewed an ad.
March Madness is over, but new data from Millennial Media and the Interactive Advertising Bureau shows just how much of a cross-platform phenomenon the NCAA tournament has become. In addition to the broadcasts on CBS and Turner Cable Networks, the March Madness Live platform made all 67 tournament basketball games available live and on-demand across PCs, tablets and smartphones. This year was the first time that wireless coverage of the games was extended beyond Apple’s iOS platform to Android phones. However, viewers in 2012 had to pay a $3.99 fee to watch March Madness games online at NCAA.com or through iOS and Android apps. The study did not break out usage by tablet, but research by comScore said 20% of total online traffic in the first round of the tournament was driven by tablets -- in this case, the iPad. The paywall likely pushed down traffic overall. Multichannel News reported that traffic to the NCAA site during the tournament fell 6% from last year to 51.6 million visits. The site averaged 1.1 million daily visitors, down 10%. Mobile traffic dropped only 1%. The Millennial/IAB study found that 69% of those surveyed used their mobile device while watching the tournament. An equal proportion said the mobile option allowed them to access content conveniently. In addition to watching live games, nearly half of mobile users (48%) checked scores during the tournament, a quarter read about teams or players, 23% checked brackets and 20% watched highlights. Among self-described “passionate fans,” 88% used their devices for March Madness-related activity, and 40% purchased a tournament-related app. Within this same group, more than a quarter (25%) followed the games mainly through their smartphone. In addition, the Millennial/IAB study said impressions on sports apps on the first day of the NCAA tournament increased 31% from the prior week. The increased activity extended beyond sports titles, as impressions on social media apps saw a 42% jump during prime-time games on the first day as tournament chatter heated up. The survey was conducted on behalf of the IAB by Harris Interactive from March 23-27 among 2,220 adults.
In an effort to help app developers promote their downloads, Google’s AdMob mobile ad network is enhancing its text banners. The Google Mobile Ads Blog noted that the new banners that can run in Google Play and iTunes Store apps on the AdMob network can carry more detailed information about the apps being promoted. The new format allows the current price of the app, its user-generated star rating and the number of reviews for the app to be integrated on the banner. “By providing more details in the ad unit, we empower users to make more informed decisions about what they are getting, what they have to pay for it and how other users like the app,” says Software Engineer for Google Mobile display Ads David Lewis in the post. Lewis says that having more information up front in the ad creative itself will lead to improved conversion rates for developers. Google Play and the Android OS must be hoping to improve their relationship with developers. While AdMob serves ads for both Android and iOS apps into both platforms, the company has a special interest in improving the metrics and the reputation of the Android app ecosystem among developers. Google has struggled against lower rates of monetization for Android app developers. App analytics firm Flurry recently reported that for every dollar of revenue the iOS platform generates for developers, the same app sees only 23 cents. Even Amazon’s fledgling Android app store fares much better, delivering 83 cents for every dollar in iOS revenue.
“Oh, come on. We’re not going to talk about this later,” my wife laments, as I promise we will pick up her chronicle of a bad day once we finish dinner. “You will just have you nose stuck in that thing as usual.” Part of my wife’s fetching technological know-nothingism is a firm refusal to speak the name of the gadgets she has learned to loathe. Except when she curses at her iPhone when it misbehaves. The iPad has become a new marital nemesis. As recent research shows, prime time is tablet time, and so a fair amount of the evening movie viewing or news catch-up gets divided across screens. Not for her, of course. She multitasks the old fashioned way –- with a magazine. “You are lost when you start with that thing,” she claims. And there is no doubt that the staggering levels of engagement on the iPad are easy to understand. Much like a simple, casual digital game, the basic acts of tapping and swiping have a rhythmic, even therapeutic effect on the user. There was no precedent for this really. I spent many years as the primary Tablet PC reviewer for a tech magazines, and I sent many hours trying to acclimate myself to the stylus-based approach to interfaces that Bill Gates promised would revolutionize interacting with computers. To Gates’ credit, he was half right. Some variety of touch interface would initiate a new era of intimacy between person and device. It just wasn’t going to be his touch interface. It is interesting to step back from individual apps and one’s own nightly tap session and call out some of the ways in which both media and marketing are evolving on the platform. To wit, I am heartened to see some advertisers use content as their best argument. In the new Daily Show app from Comedy Central, for instance, I have already run across two banner ads that caught my eye because of their specificity. A New York Times banner didn’t push the NYT app at all, but actually included a current news headline and image from the story. It drove me to NYT content, not a pitch. This struck me as enormously effective within the context of an iPad session -- which is, after all, about media consumption. The idea that the ad should be content is not entirely new. But making the banner creative and an interesting story -- in this case prominently involving "Mad Men" actor Jon Hamm, another piece of content to consume -- made tapping into it was a no-brainer. All of which underscores the common but often lost point that advertising works best when it gives consumers more of what they want -- or an opportunity to let them do more of what they are already doing. On an iPad, content is the best advertising. Has anyone been watching how Google’s iPad apps are improving? The main Google search app is now structured much more like an operating system on top of iOS itself. A wall of your Google functions -- from Maps to Mail to Google+ to Calendar -- are all in one spot, and the very good integrated browser pretty much keeps you inside the app until you need to click into another Google app like YouTube. And that app, too, has become a wall of thumbnails that has a cool zoom effect when you choose one. Each tapped video has “Related” “More from” and “Comments” tabs that make the experience so much more usable than the Web’s YouTube that you wish Google would just port the interface over to the Web. There are times when apps make me wish the Web browser had never been invented. Everyone gushes over how the iPad makes images pop. And just about every publisher now knows that slide shows are pretty much crack for users. Too often overlooked is the beauty of illustration and especially sequential art. I have already rhapsodized over how graphic narrative, comics, and line art of all kinds work brilliantly on this platform. The major engine driving a number of comics publishers, Comixology, recently started updating its content for the Retina display with hi-res images. Just stunning in the way it highlights the line work and inking! But even better, the narrative progression of this work is enhanced when each panel is highlighted and fills the screen. A tremendous example of this is a special work that Chis Ware prepared for the McSweeney’s app called appropriately “Touch Sensitive.” Ware -- arguably the smartest and most powerful graphic novelist we have -- crafts a haunting tone piece that uses touch itself as a subject and leverages the wide screen, panel structures and animation to create something new. Marvel also just issued an Avengers: Iron Man VII app that uses spoken narrative, touch interactive and comics styling to craft a narrative. The effect is much cheesier and unconvincing, however. But using the touchscreen to reimagine what visual narrative can do is very compelling. Why aren’t marketers using some of these techniques to engage us in ads that recruit us to tell the story? Whether it is content-driven advertising, Google’s self-contained universe in an app, or the evolution of graphic narrative here, the smartest providers are conforming their iPad strategies to its unique new mode of use. We spent much of last year talking up the idea of “use cases” and “mobile moments,” identifying the situations that mobile now made accessible to the brand in order to provide a valuable solution to users. The iPad raises the other piece of this, which is “user mode.” There is space that “tablet time” occupies. So much of it is in the evening, in tandem with another medium, and using an interface that has a rhythm and kinetic engagement all its own. We already know that the interface, time of day, place and mode seem to map well against how people want to browse and buy goods. That is just a piece of this puzzle. Tossing a Web-like intrusive ad into this experience seems frowsy and clueless. Merely reiterating the page and narrative structure of a Web site accesses only a fraction of the platform’s potential. And marketers should be paying closer attention to the other types of tablet content that absorb users. On devices, you will have to start thinking not only in terms of targeting time, place, person or even use case -- but also the iPadder’s likely mode and the mood. My wife, by the way, already knows this about the iPad -- and she is unconnected and unconcerned with tablets, marketing or media. "Okay, we're done talking, I guess," she says when I reach for the tablet. "We can still talk," I counter. "Well, I can talk. I don't know where the hell you go when you are in there." "Research shows that there is an incredible kind of engagement when using these things," I try to explain. "They call it 'engagement?'" she blasts back. "'Engagement' with everything but me! I think they got it backwards. 'Disengagement' seems closer."
The mobile world is not exactly getting simplified, but some consumer behaviors are beginning to take shape. While it’s likely to be some time before final usage patterns evolve, as more smartphone capabilities are utilized and more tablets are acquired, some early indicators are beginning to emerge. There are single-screen as well as multi-screen uses, as consumers view various screens for different reasons at different times. Marketers will be challenged to mine this puzzle. Depending on whom you may be trying to reach and what message can determine at least an approach or two. There is the age-old issue of the mobile Web versus apps. For example, Nielsen recently found that the majority of smartphone owners used their devices to shop, but they would rather access the mobile Web site via smartphone rather than using the retailers’ apps. They also found that during the holiday shopping season, those who did use the retailers’ apps tend to spend more time on them, and that male shoppers were more likely to try an app. Then there’s the platform issue -- with Android and Apple controlling 71 percent of the U.S. smartphone market, according to comScore, with some projections having Microsoft displace Apple for the number two spot in coming years. Although Android leads Apple in market share, Apple is number one in mobile commerce shopping satisfaction, according to the analytics company ForeSee. The type of product or service being sold and the location of the consumer will also play a significant role. As one example, the number of tickets sent to mobile phones is projected to increase to 23 billion within four years, according to Juniper Research. And this year, the researchers expect marketers to spend $15 billion globally on mobile retail campaigns, linking retailers with mobile shoppers. And for marketers who may have totally nailed how to deal with mobile Web sites, apps, platforms and location, along comes the issue of using multiple screens simultaneously. The first screen -- television -- is obviously not going away. But the second screen of the PC is migrating to the tablet, which frees consumers to use those two together, or at least in the same room. New research from GfK Knowledge Networks reported earlier this week found that more than half (52%) of minutes spent with tablets were used while watching TV. Meanwhile, these same consumers still likely have on their body the third screen of their smartphone, which is always on, and the researchers found that the same smartphone usage time spent was while with TV. Outside of multi-screen viewing, additional information from the GfK Knowledge Networks MultiMedia Mentor research found some different smartphone and tablet usage patterns, especially in daily usage based on age and sex. Overall findings among all users: