Revenues from ads running on smartphones and tablets will outstrip those from newspaper, magazine and radio ads for the first time in the U.S. this year, according to a new report from eMarketer.
Mobile ad revenues will jump 83%, to $17.7 billion. That represents almost 10% of all ad spending, as people quickly spend more and more time peering at the smartphones and kicking back with their tablets--a total of two hours and 51 minutes a day, up 32 minutes from just a year ago. Mobile ad spend will trail only that of television commercials, of course, and desktop and laptop ads.
The forecast makes it hard to believe that just two short years ago, Facebook's initial public offering suffered in part because investors weren't sure the company could find a way to make much money on mobile ads. EMarketer estimates that mobile ads on Facebook will hit 68% of its US ad revenues this year, up from 47% last year.
That said, time spent on mobile devices still far outstrips the amount of media spend, so mobile continues to make life a little tougher for the likes of
It's no news that print and radio continue to lose ground. But overall, ad spending this year will see its biggest jump in a decade. Thanks to mobile and TV ads, total ad spending will rise 5.3%, eMarketer predicts, the first time it will top 5% since 2004's 6.7% jump. That's a total of just over $180 billion.
