Edvard Munch’s, The Scream, was auctioned off at Sotheby’s in New York City at the beginning of May for a record-breaking $120MM. That’s a nice way of saying that this gaunt-faced, impressionistic figure with hollowed out eyes was valued at roughly 7% to 8% of the total US mobile advertising market in 2011. Maybe we should all be screaming!
Every consumer engagement metric — smartphone penetration, minutes used, texts sent, apps downloaded, videos consumed or searches executed – all point to the fact that consumers are fascinated by their phones and love the mobile platform. So why aren’t advertisers more broadly leveraging this most engaging, not to mention MOBILE platform to communicate to their consumers when they are at home or out in the world?
It’s not like there isn’t historical precedent for emerging technologies taking their time to standardize and professionalize en route to becoming a truly viable medium. Internet innovation has seen fits and starts, but this past week’s Internet Week conversations about viewable impressions or RTB underscore that the industry is truly maturing. There’s a focus on improving consumer experience, marketing effectiveness and eCPMs for publishers. In the desktop/laptop psyche, there is no better time to create a more level playing field Vs. TV and to provide advertisers more compelling reasons to allocate their dollars toward digital.
Mobile, on the other hand, isn’t moving fast enough, and it’s frustrating that we may not leverage the lessons from our most recent digital decade to accelerate our industry’s upward trajectory. Yes, ad dollars are up year-over year, but given how much inventory goes UNSOLD, we have major obstacles to overcome before mobile can assume its rightful place.
It’s time to lay the foundation for a brighter future, and thankfully we at AdTruth are working and meeting with an increasing number of companies that are prepared to deploy new technologies and unlock the value of mobile. We can see a brighter day when advertisers can execute big buys, set frequency caps, target and retarget consumers and accurately measure their campaign performance.
A year from now, I hope that more of us are screaming and at the same time, there’s a whole lot less for us to scream about.