eMarketer
Mobile users see a decent amount of ads: March 2014 polling by Nielsen for xAd and Telmetrics found that 70% of US adults who used smartphones, tablets or both had encountered mobile ads in the past month. Of course, getting an ad in front of a target doesn’t guarantee interaction, and the majority of mobile device users hadn’t clicked on an advertisement in the month leading up to polling. Smartphone owners were slightly more likely to click on a mobile ad, with 43% saying they had, compared with 37% of those with tablets.
March 2014 research by Survey Sampling International (SSI) for Adobe found that the platform used to serve mobile ads also made a difference in interaction. While apps claim far more time spent with mobile, mobile device users in North America were more likely to click on mobile website ads. More than one-third had done so in the past three months, compared with 26% who had interacted with an in-app mobile ad. Mobile devices used by respondents in this study included ereaders, mobile phones, smartphones, tablets and wearable devices.
But what about ads that don’t get clicked on? How can advertisers tweak them to drive more interaction? According to xAd and Telmetrics, the most popular reason smartphone and tablet users hadn’t clicked on mobile ads in the past month was because they just weren’t interested in the offering, cited by 47% and 43%, respectively—and suggesting advertisers may need to amp up targeting efforts. Irrelevant advertisements and users simply ignoring them ranked second and third.