BII MOBILE INSIGHTS: A Few Truths About Mobile Advertising

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A Few Truths About Mobile Advertising (iMedia Connection)
Mobile marketing took huge leaps forward in 2012 and everyone is projecting a blockbuster 2013. There are a few truths about mobile advertising that need to be called out to move it from 1 percent of media budgets to where it belongs.

Mobile is all family-friendly and brand safe
Rich Media campaigns can be rushed by agencies, and launch the same day
User acquisition for apps: you get exactly what you pay for

That said, there are a lot of really strong and unique attributes of mobile to focus on in 2013.

Hyper-local
Share of voice
Audience buying
Fragmentation of device IDs has calmed down
Mobile privacy
Mobile video

If agencies, direct advertisers, and app developers can ask the tough questions of their mobile ad vendors and technology partners mobile will live up to its promise in 2013.

What's Holding Back Mobile Advertising? (BI Intelligence)
Mobile is now the world's dominant computing experience. It is logical to assume that mobile will soon usurp the desktop as the dominant digital ad platform as well. Despite its potential, legitimate questions surround the widespread assumption that ad spend will skyrocket to meet engagement. In a recent report from BI Intelligence on the mobile advertising ecosystem, we give an overview of the mobile advertising industry's size and explore the "monetization problem." We also examine the mobile platform wars' impact on advertising, as well as the potential industry split between smartphones and tablets.

Facebook Is Now A Mobile Company (comScore via readwrite social)
Facebook may still be figuring out this whole monetization thing, but it is a mobile company. In fact, in the mobile app world, it's the mobile company. Based on unique visitors from comScore, Facebook leapfrogged Google Maps in October 2012 to become the most popular smartphone app in the U.S.

facebook is mobile

Facebook's app has insane levels of engagement. The Facebook app alone accounts for a whopping 23 percent of time spent on mobile apps.

facebook engagement

Next to Facebook, Instagram clocked out with 3 percent of total time spent on mobile apps. Add up the time spent on Facebook's app and time spent on Instagram, and Facebook soaked up over a quarter of the total mobile engagement in the U.S. as of December 2012.

Apple Sells 48 Million iPhones (CNN Money)
Apple reported a record quarter, boosted by strong iPhone and iPad sales, but the popularity of cheaper versions of its mobile devices pinched the company's profits. And growth is slowing.

apple sales annually

The company sold 47.8 million iPhones during the past quarter, shattering the record of 37 million that it set a year ago when the iPhone 4S debuted. However popularity of the older iPhones reduced the average selling price and contributed to Apple's pinched profit margin. As a result, Apple's profit just barely beat its total from the same quarter a year ago. By the slimmest of margin of $14 million, Apple avoided recording its first year-over-year drop in profit in nine years, as analysts had feared it might. Click here for a round up of Apple earnings.

iCloud User Base Grows To Over 250 million (Engadget)
Apple informed the world on its earnings call yesterday that its iCloud platform now boasts a quarter of a billion users. This time last year, Apple's cloud storage service had but a mere 85 million customers, but 2013 has seen that number triple to 250 million. How? We're guessing that all those iPads and iPhones it's sold in the last year probably have something to do with it. And they sold 75 million iOS products last quarter.

Retail Mobile Marketing Spend To Hit $55 Billion By 2015 (Juniper via ME)
Retailers are set to spend $28 billion on mobile marketing campaigns in 2013, according to Juniper Research, with the annual spend spiking to $55 billion by 2015. In addition to smartphones, tablets have created new ways for brands to engage with consumers, while e-commerce, which started on desktops and laptops, is becoming increasingly more mobile-based. Augmented reality, NFC, and coupons are highlighted as innovative platforms for retailers to integrate mobile in-store. Despite the figures and opportunities, however, Juniper warns that many companies still don't offer mobile websites, registration or payments.

What Mobile Means For Your Marketing (The Practical Marketer)
It's time to get out of denial. You can't look the other way any longer. Your marketing budget's already stretched to the limit. What's a small operation to do?

Visit your website from your mobile device
Try buying something
Figure out what mobile apps already exist that can help you
Consider a mobile app, or another avenue

But take action. A study by Experian finds that 44 percent of email opens happen on mobile devices. At the same time, eMarketer predicts that U.S. consumers will spend $37.44 billion on mobile shopping in 2013.

Mobile Bill Payment On The Rise (Fiserv)
Research from Fiserv, financial services technology solutions provider, has found that consumers pay their bills in multiple ways each month, and that mobile bill payments are on the rise. Payments initiated via a mobile device still make up a relatively small percentage of bill payments overall, but gained momentum year to year. Eight percent of online households (8 million total households) paid at least one monthly bill this way, up from 6 percent in 2011. In addition, 3 percent of infrequent and non-Internet users (720,000 total households) are using mobile bill payment. Drivers for mobile bill payment among consumers who have made them include: mobile as a payment option saves time (50 percent); offers anytime access (44 percent); and is most convenient when on the go (43 percent).

HTML vs HTML5: Which is Better? (The App Times)
There are still a large number of people who have stuck with using the previous version of HTML. The reasoning behind doing this is because many claim that the old HTML is still better. Here's a side-by-side comparison:

Multimedia support: HTML5
Cleanest code: Difficult comp, but HTML5 is easier
Browser compatibility: HTML
Glitches and errors: HTML

The verdict? HTML and HTML5 are very similar but at the same time are extremely different to one another. That said, HTML5 is the better of the two. This is because it is cleaner, easier to embed both video and audio and it is compatible with the most popular browsers. It also comes with a lot of new features that HTML has been in dire need of for some time now.

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