UK mobile advertising spend continues to surge ahead

2011 IAB figures show 157% growth

The UK continues to cement its position as one of the most exciting markets for mobile advertising. Figures recently released by the IAB show a 157% growth in mobile advertising when comparing 2011 with 2010. This has taken the total value of the market up from £83 million in 2010, to £203.2 million in 2011.

This is genuinely exciting stuff, but what is even more exciting is how small this figure might one day seem to be in comparison with the overall potential for the market. According to the same IAB report, mobile advertising might now be a market worth just over £203 million. However, during the same period UK internet advertising was worth over £4.5 billion. This means that mobile advertising has generated just under 5% of the total UK internet advertising revenue. Even UK direct mail was worth about £1.73 billion or just under 6 times the entire worth of the mobile advertising market.

Mobile phones are among the most personal of personal possessions, allowing users to interact with them with much more engagement than with other mediums such as direct mail or television. No other medium offers a way in which to reach a potential audience in such an intimate fashion. At least not yet!

So while these recent figures may look impressive, if viewed 3 years from now, we might then see these figures as a small fraction of what the market as actually achieved. 

Moving onto Mobile

Another funny abbreviation: MOM – Moving onto Mobile!


We recently organised our first workshop of the year about moving onto Mobile and we thought about sharing some of what we discussed during the session.

The mobile industry at large
This is the year of the mobile. Yes, seriously it is! If you look at the number of Smartphone handsets and the mobile internet users in UK, Mobile should be definitely in your marketing mix. Figures support the statement: 32 millions Smartphone handsets are estimated by end 2011 and nearly 23 million Britons use mobile internet every month. Interesting, right?

Comscore also gives you even more reasons to think about your mobile strategy.  Smartphone penetration reached 42% across the UK, France, Italy, Spain and Germany (EU5) in October, compared to 39% in the US.

Three things to consider about your mobile strategy
1.  Audience Research
2. Define Mobile properties
3. Mobile inventory control = Success!

Many considerations exist. The main one would be to choose whether you develop a new app or a mobile-friendly website. However, before you start to build apps or a mobile-optimised version of your website, it is important to understand your audience. Make sure to research your audience first, looking into smartphone devices used, the time of the day they use it and their needs and expectations.

Depending on the resources and available budgets, there isn’t really one exclusive/best way in regard to the type of mobile property (apps vs sites), although mobile-friendly sites tend to be easier to update and more flexible for ad delivery.  Developing a mobile app is ideal if you need to use some functionality of your Smartphone. You will also need to define the ad placement as well as remembering to test your rich media capabilities.

Once you gather all the information about who will be using your mobile app and have defined what  your mobile property is, consider how you will control/monitor your mobile inventory (ad-serving, in-house sales or third-party networks).

Key takeaways
The panel of our last workshop explained about the different challenges when deciding to move into the mobile space.  To put the discussion in nutshell, this is what needs to be remembered:  Mobile is like a big birthday cake at a party with thousand guests. Come early to the party rather than late otherwise you won’t have a piece of that scrumptious cake.

In other words, think about your mobile strategy now otherwise you could miss revenue opportunities. Mobile really creates new and revenue streams so ensure you have a mobile presence where your audience spends their time!

Mobile's Handy for the Holidays pt.2

When it comes to understanding mobile users and their shopping habits throughout the biggest retail period this year, our most recent Mojiva MAG tells us that many will be turning to their smartphones and tablets.  Check out the infographic below to find out what types of holiday items would be purchased from mobile devices and how much respondents would be willing to spend!

Mobile's Handy for the Holidays

When it comes to understanding mobile users and their shopping habits throughout the biggest retail period this year, our most recent Mojiva MAG tells us that many will be turning to their smartphones and tablets.  Check out the infographic below to find out when mobile users start shopping for the holidays and how their devices help them during the holiday rush!

How Mobile Opens New Opportunities by Closing the Digital Divide

Much has been written about how mobile has helped close the telecommunications gap, what is becoming apparent now is how mobile is helping to close the digital divide. For those of us old enough to remember the ‘digital divide’ was coined as a phrase during the Clinton administration, and has come to refer to those that have or have not got access to digital information.

The digital divide is visible everywhere, in families, between cities and classes and most notably between nations. Though it often is, it need not be a reflection of relative wealth and you can find yourself on the wrong side of divide due to location, upbringing or just plain luck.

The spread of mobile communications and the development of better handsets and enhanced carrier capabilities mean that web access through mobile is now becoming far more commonplace, even if it is simply a byproduct of the spread of the mobile phone.

This is now starting to have a noticeable on the level of web penetration and how access to the internet is measured, as the article “How mobile is forcing us to change the way we measure the Internet” illustrates. This is all very well but what does it mean to those of us interested in mobile marketing?

Well just as mobile phones allowed the telecommunications industry to leapfrog forward in developing markets, the same effect is now being felt with regards to access to digital information. These new networks are creating new audiences and markets to which access via new media was strictly limited beforehand.

The infrastructure necessary to power mobile networks and access to the mobile web is much cheaper to establish and maintain than fixed line telecommunications and internet access. The cost of smartphones though for many still puts effective mobile web access out of reach, this though is changing quickly.

The increasing range of Android and other cheaper smartphones means that the developing markets will develop very quickly, and are likely to be bright spots of growth over the next few years. Of course it won’t only be in developing markets that smartphone usage grows as they quickly become the norm globally

As mobile use continues to spread in areas like Asia, Latin America and elsewhere this helps establish mobile advertising as a truly global medium, and Mojiva as a truly global network can help you utilize this as a great new tool. As we know mobile phones are all about the message, but now they can help spread that message far and wide. 

Why is MSO Important?

MSO is our newest TLA for Mobile Site Optimisation. Not sure if someone has used this before but this could become the hottest hash key on Twitter, right?

A first step into mobile is to optimise the design of your online site for mobile users. Why?  Well, the user experience is mainly the reason: mobile sites need to fit to most Smartphone’s screens - nothing is worse than having to zoom in and out. As explained in our mobile marketing blog post “Is it time for a mobile friendly website?”, many online businesses have not embraced mobile yet.

Some retailers rush into building apps while forgetting that their sites aren’t very mobile-friendly.  This article is very interesting as it shows a few examples of retailer apps that could have been better: "Mobile commerce: 25 essential tips".

A dilemma has always existed on what to do first:  create a mobile-friendly version of your site or creating an app. Focus first on Mobile Optimisation would be my recommendation. Take one of my colleagues as an example; she doesn’t often download apps on her Android phone. Instead, she launches a browser and search on Google. Results are often the same: a lot of sites don’t have an optimised version of their sites. While the quick solution would be to change phone, retailers may lose a lot of conversion out of this (Users will usually close the browser out of frustration).

Consult your SEO team while optimising the design of your site is a must as you want them involved with the mobile search engine optimisation.  How is Google algorithm ranking your mobile website? What do you have to do to make sure that your mobile-friendly site appears first? Responses are with your SEO experts.

The subject on how to optimise your website for mobile device is perhaps not new. In fact, it has become essential for every brand to think about Mobile:

1- There is a market to seize quickly:  14 million people have a Smartphone in UK and mobile device sales are superior to desktops. Also, nobody leaves home without their phones (unless you’ve been out for a heavy drinking night) as they feel naked (not literally I hope).

2- Searches on Google via mobile device will overtake searches from desktop. The mobile Web will be bigger than desktop Internet use by 2015 according to Morgan Stanley.

3- Engagement with mobile users is more effective due to the number of targeting options available with mobile ad campaigns.

4- Remember how reluctant users were to buy through e-commerce websites? Well it is not the case anymore and this will happen with Mobile Commerce, M-commerce.  Mobile is currently driving around 10% of visits to e-commerce sites.

Once your online site is optimised for mobile users, the monetisation of your mobile-friendly site can start. If you are considering working with an ad network like Mojiva (no pressure), an API will be required in order to serve your ads.

If you're a national brand or advertising agency and want to talk about your mobile strategy, please contact us and we’ll discuss it over coffee or even lunch!

Mojiva EMEA

Welcome to the first ever Mojiva EMEA publisher blog, your new source of information on the Mojiva mobile ad network, the EMEA mobile publisher marketplace and fascinating tidbits of information on mobile advertising in general.

Looking back, it seems that each year since phones became small enough to fit in your pocket has been heralded as the ‘The Year of the Mobile.’ Looking back, we do seem to have had so many false dawns that you might have thought that the sun was never going to come up.

Through the combination of smarter handsets, and true mobile ad serving and network solutions such as Mocean Mobile and Mojiva (what, you thought there wouldn’t be a soft sell?!), we have seen the arrival of workable mobile advertising solutions. We here at Mojiva are excited about this (yes, really) and want to bring our publishers - current and future - the benefits of these solutions.

Whether they are world recognized brands, the new kids on the mobile block or anywhere in between, our aim is to help publishers make the most out of their mobile presence. iPhone or RIM, mobile app or mobile web, we are committed to helping ALL publishers by connecting them with the right advertisers for the right territories. We want to be the catalyst that helps you grow your business, whilst of course helping to expand ours.

Anyway, that’s enough about us, and you’ll be hearing much more from us over the coming weeks and months. We want to hear about you and give you the chance to catch up and see what wonderful people we are in person.