Google Mobile Ads Blog

Android developers: Easier conversion tracking with AdMob

2012-01-26T10:14:00.000-08:00

One of the biggest headaches in promoting your app is being able to work out how many downloads a specific ad campaign generated. AdMob is committed to providing app developers tools to optimize advertising spend and maximize ROI. App Conversion Tracking helps you do just that by measuring your app download campaign performance.

We’re rolling out a new feature that makes this even easier--automatic app conversion tracking for Android campaigns. All AdMob Android app download campaigns will now automatically report conversion data from the Android Market. This means that you’ll be able to see conversions from your app download campaign without configuring any special code.

To see conversion data for your Android download campaigns, simply go to the App Conversion Tracking section of your account. You’ll be able to see the number of downloads driven by your AdMob advertising campaign. In addition, you’ll be able to keep tabs on the cost per download and conversion rate so you can better optimize your campaign.

Posted by: Morgan Hallmon, Product Manager, Mobile Ads

New research: Global surge in smartphone usage, UK sees biggest jump with 15% increase

2012-01-25T08:11:00.000-08:00

Mobile devices are mainstream. In fact, according to our newest research more consumers in the US, UK, Germany, France and Japan use a mobile phone (feature phone or smartphone) than a computer (desktop or laptop).

But our most significant findings centered on the clear consumer shift to smartphones. This trend was evident in all countries, with the UK showing the largest increase in smartphone usage from 30 to 45% of the total population. We also found that the demographics of smartphone owners are shifting. Smartphone usage among females increased in all five countries. Smartphone ownership also rose among those aged 45+ in the US, UK and France.

We partnered with Ipsos to conduct this research with a goal of gaining greater insight into consumer usage of mobile devices, the shift to smartphones and the emergence of tablets as a fourth screen. This study was fielded amongst the total population in the US, UK, Germany, France and Japan. Phase 1 of the research was conducted in January and February 2011 and Phase 2 in September and October 2011.

Some of the key findings of this new research include:

Consumers are clearly shifting from feature phones to smartphones. Smartphone penetration reached 45% in the UK, 38% in the US and France, 23% in Germany and 17% in Japan.

Consumers are increasingly using their smartphones for Internet access. Germany saw the biggest increase with the percentage of smartphone owners using their device for daily Internet access jumping from 39% to 49%, while Japan had the highest percentage accessing the Internet daily on their smartphone at 88%. A little over two-thirds of smartphone users in the US and over half of smartphone users in the UK access the mobile Internet daily.

Smartphone owners are continuing to get online on their computers. Across all five countries approximately 75% of smartphone owners said they continued to use their computer to access the Internet daily.

Consumers are embracing tablets as the fourth screen. Tablet usage increased across all five countries with the highest penetration amongst the total population in the US at 11%. The rate of tablet usage is even higher amongst smartphone owners - hitting 17% in the US, 11% in Japan and 10% in the UK.

Download the PDF report here to see the full set of data from this research.

Posted by: Nicole Leverich, Google Mobile Ads Marketing

New targeting options available to AdWords mobile advertisers

2012-01-17T11:30:00.000-08:00

Online advertisers seek to effectively reach people across all devices and platforms. This means that regardless of whether your customer is on a computer, a mobile phone, or a tablet, we want to provide you with specific ways to reach them through targeted ad campaigns.

AdWords advertisers already have access to a range of campaign targeting options. For our advertisers running mobile campaigns,we offer the ability to run separate mobile and desktop campaigns, the ability to target tablet devices, or target specific mobile phone carriers in your country (1).

Today we’re introducing two advanced targeting options that are now available in your AdWords campaign settings: WiFi targeting, and targeting by mobile operating system version.

WiFi Targeting
To reach users when you know they’ll have a high speed connection, you’ll now be able to target your campaigns to mobile users specifically on a WiFi connection. If you’re currently targeting users on specific mobile carriers, you can now target users on WiFi connections too, and expand your reach. This is also useful if your campaign or landing page has high bandwidth content, like videos that you’d like mobile users to access.

AdWords advertisers in these countries can now use WiFi targeting

To get maximum visibility for your ads we recommend targeting all available carriers and Wi-Fi traffic.

OS Version Targeting
You can already target mobile users by their operating system platform. For example, you can specify whether you would like to reach Android, iOS or WebOS devices with your ads. We’re now giving you even more granular targeting options if your application or service is only applicable to particular platform versions, such as “iOS version 4.0 and above”.

Take advantage of these new campaign targeting options in your Campaign Settings. Stay tuned to the Google Mobile Ads blog for updates on new ways target and reach your mobile customers!

(1)
Available in select countries: http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=86623

Posted by: Morgan Hallmon, Product Manager, Mobile Ads

A look back at 2011

2011-12-19T08:00:00.000-08:00

Mobile turned a corner this year. As smartphones and tablets became a part of our everyday lives, business owners’ conversations shifted from 'Why should I advertise on mobile or build a mobile website?' to 'How do I get started?’.

Five major industry trends emerged in 2011 that will carry us into 2012, and beyond.

1 - Everyone goes mobile
Smartphones and tablets proved that they weren’t just for the geekiest - er, ‘tech savviest’ - among us. These devices are increasingly becoming the norm and they continue to change how people connect with each other, and with businesses, everywhere. According to our research with IPSOS earlier this year:
79% of smartphone consumers use their phones to help with shopping, from comparing prices, to finding more product info, to locating a retailer.

70% use their smartphones while in a store.

77% have contacted a business via mobile, with 61% calling and 59% visiting the local business.

It’s not just that more people are using smartphones and tablets (though the numbers are skyrocketing at an accelerating pace)—it’s that a huge, and fast-growing base of smartphone users, now expect to engage with businesses on mobile. The mainstream consumer got mobilized in 2011.

2 - Mobile search transforms shopping, forever
Analyzing mobile search trends helped the industry better understand how people were using their mobile devices in 2011. For starters, we learned a lot about the ‘timing’ of mobile and tablets. These devices enable us to be constantly connected to the internet, as mobile usage has proven to be complementary to the desktop. We got a clearer picture of how search is changing the ways we shop and connect with businesses. More people are looking for deals both en route to stores and within them on mobile - in the retail category, “Black Friday” related mobile queries were over 200% higher this year than in 2010. Users have also developed some mobile-specific shopping habits - for example, 44% of all searches for last minute gifts and store locator terms are projected to come from mobile devices this holiday season. For procrastinators, mobile has come to the rescue!

In October, we looked at some of the newest ways marketers can build their businesses via mobile search. But, this is only the beginning - whether people are trying to find or call a business, compare prices in a store, or visit a site or app directly from their phones, search and search ads will be the tools that shape a new shopping experience, enabling us connect with businesses, research and buy products on or offline, all via mobile.

3 - Progress with the mobile advertising pipes
As an industry, we came a long way in terms of improving the ‘pipes’ - the systems, products and technologies that advertisers use to build, serve, and measure mobile ads. It’s still early days, but the progress with standards like MRAID and the momentum behind HTML5, are helping to rally the mobile community and make it easier for marketers and customers to connect on the platform. Getting existing tools to ‘speak mobile’ has been another key to helping mobile advertising grow-up as quickly users and businesses want it to. Across search and display, the tools the industry is already familiar with are getting mobilized. There’s plenty of work still to do, but significant progress is being made - watch this space in 2012.

4 - Tablets join the mobile party
Tablets made quite a splash this year. Usage trends sharpened - we’re seeing that people people use these devices to shop, consume media, have fun, and they do so most frequently in the evenings. Tablets are a third screen to be reckoned with for marketers - we saw a 440% growth in traffic from tablets in November 2011 compared to December 2010 on the AdMob network. The business potential is tremendous: not only are users more inclined to shop and make purchases on tablets, but because campaigns can be more effective running across several screens instead of one, tablets offer an incremental opportunity for marketers. Our research with Nielsen showed that campaigns on several screens can be ‘Better Together’ - indeed, in cases like Adidas’, that proved to be true.

5 - Businesses start (actually) thinking mobile first
Smartphones and tablets aren’t small desktop computers - they’re new devices being used in entirely new ways. This year, businesses began to embrace this at scale and many saw good things happen when they built ad campaigns and websites specifically for mobile. Ticketsnow’s success with a mobile optimized site - increased site traffic, and more ticket sales - is just one example of the benefits of building for mobile. Initiatives like GoMo and platform-specific ad features will help businesses better connect with mobile customers in the coming months, and beyond.

It’s hard to believe, but as far as the industry has come in 2011, we’re still in the earliest chapters of mobile’s story. The ways people connect to businesses on their mobile devices and the tools they’re using to connect from them progressed by leaps and bounds this year and soon, we’ll see the mainstream shift that changes the way mobile connects people with brick-and-mortar storefronts as well. Mobile will be moving full speed ahead in 2012 so keep those sleeves rolled-up and those seatbelts fastened - we’ll see you then.

Posted by: Karim Temsamani, VP Mobile Ads

AdWords on mobile helps Regtransfers reach its on-the-move customer base

2011-12-15T11:37:00.000-08:00

For sectors like motoring where target customers are inherently on the move, mobile is a critical marketing and sales channel. Regtransfers, a UK market leader in the field of personal number plates, recognised that mobile offered an ideal way to reach their audience of gadget-loving, tech-savvy car drivers, and they embraced a suite of Google tools to help.

With Google AdWords, Regtransfers had driven users to its desktop website with considerable success, so they began their mobile activity by creating an AdWords for mobile campaign and simply replicated the keywords used in the desktop campaign.

They’d also found Sitelinks useful in the desktop campaign, and since mobile search ads offer the chance to present two Sitelinks, Regtransfers was quick to take advantage. The first Sitelink on their mobile search ads clicks straight to the inventory search facility; the second Sitelink employs click-to-call. This enables a potential customer to automatically reach the call centre without navigating to the website. There’s no need to copy, dial or re-key a phone number, making it that much easier to convert a browser into a customer.

Next Regtransfers launched an iPhone app to let customers search for registrations, make enquiries and complete purchases. As with click-to-call, the app removes barriers that might otherwise prevent easy engagement.

Finally, Regtransfers implemented remarketing campaigns both for desktop and mobile web users. Search ads first drive traffic to the site, but then if a visitor doesn’t sign up for future communication, download the app, obtain the magazine, make a phone call or email an enquiry, Regtransfers can remarket to them by displaying tailored ads on sites throughout the Google Content Network.

So what about the numbers? Since implementing their AdWords mobile campaign, Regtransfers’ mobile traffic has increased 100%. With a cost-per-conversion that is 48% less on average than on desktop, the click-through rate across the mobile campaign is 93% better than the desktop campaign that it’s based on. Regtransfers’ mobile AdWords campaigns are now delivering 73% more calls than when they first began.

To download the full Regtransfers case study, click here.

Posted by: Matt Brocklehurst, Product Marketing Manager

Analyzing Christmas presents: Make merry, go mobile

2011-12-14T11:00:00.000-08:00

Smartphones and tablets are the biggest thing to hit Santa’s workshop since the sleigh. According to recent Google research, we’re using mobile devices in booming numbers for searching, shopping and browsing before, during and after December 25th.

E-commerce is more important than ever this Yuletide, and mobile is driving a lot of this. While an eDigital study shows that one in three UK smartphone users engaged in M-commerce in the build-up to Christmas last year, conversions don’t tell the whole story. Many mobile users are turning to their phones to browse products, compare prices and search for physical store locations as well.

An analysis of UK search volumes on desktop versus mobile has found that in November 2011 mobile searches on popular Christmas gifts represented 14.60% of the online total – a jump from 1.83% in 2008 and still growing steadily. Mobile search is becoming increasingly critical in driving footfall too; Google predicts that 44% of total searches for last minute gifts and store locations will be from mobile devices this holiday season. We’re also seeing that 24% of UK consumers use their mobiles for in-store comparison.

Google research also reveals a “triple peak opportunity” on mobile. Data from the past two years show that UK mobile queries for top retail brand terms spike three times in the season of giving. The first peak arrives at the end of November with the last payday before Christmas. The second is in the final days before the holiday itself, and the third coincides with the kick-off of January sales. And this opportunity is growing. These kinds of search queries demonstrate 166% year-on-year growth.

Tablets and smartphones remain among the most desirable of gifts, so it’s worth remembering that mobile display advertising offers a chance for brands to engage with mobile owners from the day they take their new device out of the box. We’ve studied post-Christmas daily AdMob activity in the UK and know that impressions ramp up immediately after Christmas Eve, driven by the acquisition of new smartphones and tablets.

This doesn’t stop when Santa kicks off his boots. Once Christmas and Boxing Day are out of the way, post-holiday sales drive renewed online activity. Queries on mobile recover from the temporary lull more quickly than desktop. Search volumes of the top 1,000 commercial queries illustrate that in the week after Christmas, mobile queries increase 35%, while on desktop the rise is just 2%.

So what can you do to have a merry mobile Christmas? We’ve made a list of top tips for the season:
Remember that mobile is the link between online and offline shopping and design mobile sites and campaigns accordingly.

Align messaging across your TV, desktop, mobile and tablet advertising for maximum impact.

Optimise your search campaigns for mobile for greatest performance.

Activate the click-to-call and hyperlocal features in your mobile search ads. This will enable users to reach you easily and get locally-relevant information including distance and directions to find and navigate to your business.

AdMob’s latest targeting options allow you to serve ads specifically to newly activated mobiles. Use the network to engage users with your brand name, products and offers on their new devices.

Ensure mobile search and display campaigns have sufficient budgets over the Christmas holidays when mobile usage peaks.

Read our presentation on the research outlined here plus lots more insight on the power of mobile advertising at Christmas by clicking this link here.

Posted by Matt Brocklehurst, Product Marketing Manager

Going mobile in Mobile, Alabama

2011-12-14T09:00:00.000-08:00

What happens when a community commits to mobilize together, over the course of three days? It sounds like a theoretical question, but thanks to Mobile, Alabama’s, hospitality and innovation we had the opportunity to find out. That’s how a clever play on words turned into Mobilizing Mobile--a three-day celebration of local community, small business and the mobile web.

Part of the GoMo initiative, Mobilizing, Mobile was an event where business owners of Mobile were invited to learn and take action in order to “Go Mobile” with a little help from Google, DudaMobile, and Mobify. The event kicked off at Space 301 where Mobile’s Mayor Sam Jones and Winn Hallett, President of Mobile’s Chamber of Commerce, welcomed Google to their city. Several of Mobile’s businesses including LuLu's at Homeport Marina talked about the importance of mobile and we unveiled the first two newly mobilized sites: Distinguished Young Women and the Festival of Flowers. That evening Red Square hosted an event for agencies where Jason Spero, Director of Google Mobile Ads, and Edward Bocches, Chief Innovation Officer at Mullen, spoke on the importance of mobile for ad agencies.

The next day, the real mobilizing began as hundreds of business owners poured into Space 301 to create mobile-friendly versions of their websites, attend mobile business seminars, explore the Google expo and enjoy some delicious local fare.

Check out the action in this quick recap video:

In just 48 hours, nearly 500 mobile-friendly websites were created and launched. You can see some great “Before and After” shots here. Over 400 businesses committed to "going mobile" by signing the GoMo Pledge and hundreds learned about how to grow their businesses with mobile and digital tools in classroom sessions. You can find more event highlights on the Mobilizing Mobile, AL recap pages on the GoMo website.

All Critters Pet Sitters, a pet sitting service in Mobile, AL decided to “Go Mo.” Here’s their site before (left) and after (right) their one-on-one consultation at Mobilizing, Mobile.

As we look ahead to next year (and beyond), mobile’s role in our lives will only continue to grow. We can look to Mobile, Alabama, for inspiration, as we watch how the sites created during Mobilizing Mobile affect consumers and businesses alike. And, for the rest of us, ‘tis the season for New Year’s resolutions! The commitment to ‘GoMo’ may be a good one to add to your list for next year. We’re looking forward to more Mo’ in other cities, and countries, in 2012.

Posted by: Jesse Haines, Google Mobile Ads Marketing

PrivacyStar scales Android business with AdMob

2011-12-13T09:01:00.000-08:00

With the rapid smartphone growth, it’s no surprise that consumers are downloading a huge number of apps--10 billion on Android alone, as of last week. Many app developers are recognizing the opportunity to develop on Android, including PrivacyStar, a small privacy services company offering smartphone users the ability to block unwanted calls from telemarketers via their mobile app. To help grow their business on Android, PrivacyStar looked to AdMob to drive quality downloads of their app.

PrivacyStar had used a variety of marketing channels to promote their app, including desktop display and television advertising. While successful, this initial acquisition strategy resulted in relatively high cost-per-acquisition (CPA), with downloads costing upwards of $5. Seeing the need to reach their audience while on specific smartphone devices and slash CPA, the PrivacyStar team decided to try in-app advertising across a number of mobile ad networks to drive users to download their app directly to their devices.

AdMob was able to deliver and quickly become their most effective channel of advertising. Other mobile ad networks struggled to maintain a low CPA as they grew on Android inventory. The team then began optimizing their advertising within other mobile apps on the AdMob network—informed by data from Google Analytics. App placements were limited to particular app categories to focus their audience and placements that didn’t meet the aggressive CPM targets were excluded. Within a month of these optimizations, cost per acquisition fell to less than $2, a fraction of their initial acquisition cost. Additionally, the quality of downloads that AdMob drove were far superior, with more users upgrading to a monthly subscription.

The success that PrivacyStar has achieved with AdMob and Google Analytics has them poised for continued growth on Android. For more details on PrivacyStar’s approach, check out the full case study.

Posted by: Eduardo Fenili, AdMob Sales Executive

eBay Boosts App Downloads using Google AdMob Mobile Ad Network

2011-12-12T09:49:00.000-08:00

Shopping on the go
eBay the world’s leading online marketplace connects millions of buyers and sellers globally. In 2010, the total worth of goods sold on eBay globally was US$61.7 billion.

eBay's entire portfolio of mobile applications surpassed 50 million downloads globally since
the launch of mobile in 2008. In 2010, consumer’s bought nearly US$2 billion worth of goods
globally through eBay’s mobile applications. This is expected to increase to almost $5 billion in 2011.

eBay’s main iPhone application is available in eight languages and 190 countries and has been downloaded more than 20 million times since its debut in 2008. The company’s Android app is gaining ground apace as Android usage accelerates worldwide.

Down under—all over mobile
Australia is one of eBay’s hottest mobile markets. Between 5 to 10 per cent of Australian iPhone owners log into eBay’s mobile app daily.

On an average day on eBay.com.au, an electronics item is sold every 6 seconds; a laptop every 13 minutes; a sports item every 25 seconds; a car every 22 minutes; and the list goes on.

With AdMob, eBay saw an opportunity to capitalize on the growing popularity of smartphones,
which constitute almost half of traffic in the AdMob network. (1) The company also looked toward to taking advantage of the “stickiness” of smartphone apps: users of iOS and Android platforms regularly spend at least 79 minutes a day using apps. (2)

From tried to true
During the AdMob push, Android app downloads increased 48% when compared with the same time period pre-campaign. Cost-per-click was significantly lower than traditional online display advertising, and cost-per-download. To further advance its mobile initiatives, eBay has created a new mobile-optimized website for eBay.com.au and plans to expand mobile advertising activities.

(1) May 2010 Mobile Metrics Report from Google AdMob (metrics.admob.com)
(2) May 2010 Mobile Metrics Report from Google AdMob (metrics.admob.com)

Posted by Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Manager

Engaging consumers on tablets: new ad formats

2011-12-08T10:28:00.000-08:00

Tablet devices went mainstream this year and people are using them - 65% of consumers who own tablets use them at least one hour per day. Consumers are embracing them as the third digital screen in their lives. Over the last few months, we've researched the ways people use their tablets on a daily basis and have recognized some emerging trends. Shopping, consuming media, gaming are all popular tablet activities according to our recent study. And, daily search trends suggest tablets are used more frequently in the evenings and at nights.

We’ve also looked at how consumers engage with ads on tablets. Our research shows that they have higher expectations of ads on tablets, believing they should be more interactive and touch screen friendly.

To help marketers reach these engaged consumers we are launched new tablet-specific ad formats. On the display side, today we are launching new Rich Media Designs for Mobile. These new rich media templates will make it easy for advertisers to create rich media ads for tablets using existing assets (photos, logos, etc.) and then implement them across platforms (mobile, tablet and desktop). Advertisers can use these templates in a number of ways, including to interact with a specific product, feature a collection of products or promote foot traffic to a specific store location.

For tablet search advertisers, we are launching Media Ads in beta this week. Media Ads take advantage of the large, interactive touchscreen by bringing video directly into an ad on the search results page. Advertisers who want to engage consumers with video content can now use Media Ads to provide an immersive and engaging video watching experience. In addition to watching video game, TV or movie trailers, US consumers will also be able to view locally relevant movie showtimes right within the ad.

Tablet users can view movie, game, and TV trailers in a full screen overlay right from Google.com

These new tablet-specific ad formats build on the launch of new tablet-specific ad formats on AdMob and tablet-targeting in Adwords earlier this year.

While most advertisers do not need to create tablet-only campaigns today, they should start thinking about how they can engage their customers on Tablets in distinct ways and using made-for tablet formats, now and in 2012. Tablets are just getting started and we plan on continuing to invest in building tablet first consumer experiences and ad units.

Posted by: Karim Temsamani, VP of Mobile Ads

Liberty University leveraged mobile to drive direct responses at lower cost-per-conversion

2011-12-05T10:03:00.000-08:00

Liberty University Online has long been able to reach and engage prospective students as they searched for education options from their desktop computers. However, with the growth of mobile search activity, Liberty recognized a new opportunity to reach the people on a new platform. Liberty noticed rapid growth in mobile traffic to their own website, which closely mirrored industry-wide trends in mobile usage growth. According to Google internal data, education-related search volume is increasing rapidly and is projected to grow to over 17% by the end of 2011.

Liberty started advertising their online programs on both desktop and mobile. After seeing initial success, Liberty broke out mobile campaigns for their branded traffic, and continued to monitor and optimize the performance specifically for mobile. Executive Director of Admissions Steve Peterson was surprised at the immediate results from mobile.

“Sometimes when you’re trying new things, your tolerance is a little higher for what you’re willing to accept,” Steve said. “The thing that was surprising was how well it performed in a short period of time compared to stuff we’ve been doing for years. So when you have that out of the gate, we just want to keep scaling until we see some kind of diminishing returns.”

Liberty hasn’t seen diminishing returns yet. In the first six months of mobile-only campaigns, Liberty saw effectiveness and efficiency improve for conversion volume and cost-per-conversion:

49% increase in number of conversions
50% decrease in cost-per-conversion

Now, Liberty plans to break out mobile traffic from all their campaigns and is pursuing a full-fledged mobile landing page strategy. Mobile represents both an immediate and long-term opportunity for Liberty.

Full case study can be downloaded here.

Posted by Kevin Otsuka, Associate Product Marketing Manager, Mobile Ads

Consumers on tablet devices: having fun, shopping and engaging with ads

2011-11-30T11:02:00.000-08:00

Tablets have quickly emerged as a distinct third digital screen in consumers lives that fill the gap between desktops and smartphones. But there are still many open questions about exactly how consumers are using them. We explored tablet search trends earlier this year, but wanted to dig deeper and answer key questions such as: What are the contrasts between tablet use, laptop use, and smartphone use and how are consumers engaging across these devices? What are the most common activities (playing games, searching, reading, etc.) that tablets are used for? What ads are most relevant and useful based on how people are using the devices?

Tablets are for fun, entertainment, relaxation, while laptops are for work
One of our studies, a diary study that had people record every occasion that they used their tablet over a two-week period, found that most consumers use their tablets for fun, entertainment and relaxation while they use their desktop computer or laptop for work. Tablet devices are personal - 91% of the time that people spend on their tablet devices is for personal rather than work related activities. When a consumer gets a tablet, we’ve found that they quickly migrate many of their entertainment activities from laptops and smartphones to this new device.

Tablet owners are building the device into their daily routine. Our research found that the most frequent tablet activities are checking email, playing games and social networking. We also found that people are doing more activities in shorter bursts on weekdays (e.g. social networking, email) while engaging in longer usage sessions on weekends (e.g. watching videos/TV/movies).

Tablets are multi-tasking devices with at least 42% of activities occurring while doing another task or engaging with another entertainment medium. Of all the activities that people do on tablets, checking email, playing games, social networking and searching are the ones most frequently done in front of the TV. Many consumers also used their tablets to check email while eating, and listen to music while cooking.

The activities shown in the above chart were self-reported by respondents.

Tablets primarily stay home, few travel
But unlike smartphones that go everywhere and laptops that travel between work and home, few consumers take their tablets with them when they leave the house. However, consumers do take their tablets on vacation or work trips where they use them as a laptop replacement and a small number take them on their commute. Interestingly, our recent research found that tablets are for the most part a one-person device, although there are consumers who share their tablet with other family or household members.

Tablets are, however, mobile within the home, with the highest usage taking place on the couch, from the bed and in the kitchen.

The activities and locations shown in the above chart were self-reported by respondents.

Consumers are shopping on tablets
Many consumers do a lot of window shopping on their tablet and our data shows that they are making more and more purchases on their tablet devices. Indeed, tablets figure to be a significant new way for people to be shopping this holiday season. While shopping they are engaging with familiar brands through social media sites, deals discounts, and navigating directly to trusted shopping sites.

We also found that people are using their tablets for activities that they are also doing in the real world, such as searching for something in their local area, shopping (browsing and purchasing), and managing finances.

For many people, websites and apps designed for smartphones just don’t cut it on tablets. Instead consumers are taking advantage of the bigger screen and prefer using fully featured apps and the full desktop sites on their tablet.

We found that some of those activities also extend to additional devices (e.g. smartphone, laptop, etc.). These activities included shopping (both browsing and purchasing), searching for information, managing finances, checking the calendar and checking email.

Consumers don’t view ads differently on tablets, but they do expect more interactivity
Consumers are engaging with useful, relevant and rich ads that take advantage of the touchscreen interface on tablets. Some consumers expect more interactivity from ads on tablets than they do from ads on their desktop computer.

We believe that tablet ownership will continue to rapidly grow in 2012 and that tablet usage may change over time, particularly as smaller devices come on the market. We plan on continuing to conduct research to understand consumers’ uses of their tablet devices and are excited to share these research insights with you.

Posted by: Jenny Gove and John Webb, User Experience Research, Mobile Ads

Asia-Pacific: Toyota drives downloads of first iPad app in Indonesia with Google AdMob campaign

2011-11-21T09:36:00.000-08:00

Toyota launched its Model AA, the company’s very first passenger car in the 1930s, not long after Ford’s Model A. Now 75 years later and 70 models in its product line, the Japanese automaker is the third-largest car manufacturer in the world and one of its most trusted brands.

Accustomed to its vanguard role in an ever-evolving industry, Toyota immediately embraced the digital marketplace with online marketing campaigns that have naturally morphed from desktop to mobile computing. According to a recent Google/Ipsos survey, 21% of urban Indonesian phone owners own a smartphone, a significant marketing opportunity for Toyota.

Converting iPad users into Toyota customers
With a population of over 300 million in Indonesia, Toyota Indonesia is capitalizing on consumers’ predilection for mobile computing by targeting new and core customers who use an Apple iPad. With more than 25 million people worldwide already toting around the sleek tablet computer, the automaker used Google’s mobile ad network to capitalize on this explosive new marketing channel.

“At Toyota, we pride ourselves in leveraging cutting-edge technology, be it automotive or computing. Reaching out to customers on such an exciting new platform like the iPad really energizes our marketing efforts. Google’s mobile ads provide the critical channel to connect our company with customers,” says Joko Trisanyoto beber, marketing director of Toyota Astra Motor (TAM).

They created the company’s first iPad mobile-optimized site and employed Google’s mobile ads network—encompassing over 89,000 websites and apps worldwide—to target user eyeballs during a 13-day advertising campaign targeted at the vibrant Indonesian market.

Banner ads appeared above or below a broad spectrum of applications—from city-search-sites to currency conversion—touting the download of a customized Toyota application. When people clicked through to the site, they received more information with the option of downloading the M-Toyota app, which delivers information about Toyota products, credit simulations, addresses of dealers, workshops, services, community, price, and other information, all served from a mobile-optimized website.

"Now that information can be obtained easily without having to call and sit at the computer. We make it easy for Toyota owners and those who want to know about Toyota's development," says beber.

The campaign results were encouraging. More than 9,000 users viewed the beckoning banner ad and elected to continue on to the corresponding advert, representing an overall click through rate (CTR) of 1.36%, with nearly 5,660 clicks coming through AdMob. Nearly 4,000 users then proceeded to download the actual application. During the campaign, the M-Toyota application was elevated to the Top 10 Favorite List on the App Store, within the “Lifestyle” category.

For Toyota, advertising on the mobile web is a natural extension of the iconic company’s reputation for cutting-edge innovation. Google AdMob has already become an integral element in the automaker’s marketing efforts to capitalize on the nascent mobile-device marketplace.

Says beber, “The promising results we obtained from this first AdMob campaign validate this exciting new marketing channel. Connecting a smart, affluent demographic like iPad users to the Toyota brand makes perfect sense.”

Posted by Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Manager

You can now see mobile ad performance in Google Analytics

2011-11-17T17:08:00.000-08:00

(Cross-posted on the Google Analytics Blog)

Starting this week, some of you will see enhanced Analytics reports with mobile ad performance metrics. All AdWords reports in the new interface will be gaining a new visual toggle as shown below for “All”, “High-end Mobile” and “Tablet” ads. All AdWords metrics available in Google Analytics can be segmented by these new mobile and tablet dimensions.

As more consumers begin to make use of tablets or high-end mobile devices, businesses need to understand this shift towards mobile and adapt your marketing mix. This mobile ads reporting enhancement in Google Analytics is one of many steps that we are taking towards helping you make more sense of how mobile advertising interacts with your business.

Please let us know what you think, and suggest any other mobile measurement options you’d like to see that help make sense of your mobile advertising effectiveness.

Posted by Phil Mui, Google Analytics team

Asia-Pacific: Samsung and Google Mobile Ads

2011-11-17T15:49:00.000-08:00

Promoting on-the-go productivity

The Galaxy Tab 7 was Samsung’s first offering in the exploding tablet-computing market, having debuted simultaneously in Asia and the US in late fall 2010. It quickly found critical and consumer advocates for its uncompromising design and functionality. Technology publication Engadget deemed the Tab the “best Android tablet on the market,” adding that the “entire experience was snappy,” while CNET offered: “Galaxy Tab is a beautiful product with features that will make iPad owners envious.”

To heighten the buzz around Galaxy Tab’s product launch in India, Samsung turned to Google to leverage the powerful AdMob network in the mobile-centric facet of the campaign. Focusing on males aged 18-34—known as the strongest sector of mobile-device users, Samsung was confident that successful persuasion of these early adopters would spur quicker acceptance of tablet computers.

600,000 click-throughs
To spur demand, Samsung marketing developed enticing banner ads that appeared on apps tailored to a young demographic. The ads exhorted viewers to visit the mobile-optimized site; those that did click-through found additional product information and the ability to download a free demo of the Tab.

Not surprisingly, the mobile-ad campaign results for this mobile-savvy country were impressive. More than 600,000 users were enticed to the Samsung site. Of those, 350,000 delved deeper for additional product information and 7,500 gave their phone numbers to secure a demo download.

For Samsung, incorporating AdMob’s advertising network into its overall marketing campaigns has become standard operating procedure—the expenditure translates into the one of the company’s most efficacious uses of marketing dollars.

Posted by Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Manager

More ways to reach your audience with YouTube mobile ads

2011-11-16T12:36:00.000-08:00

(Cross-posted on the Inside Adwords Blog)

There’s no debate that the world is going mobile. Mobile web searches have grown five times over the past two years. YouTube mobile now gets more than 400 million views a day, representing 13 percent of our total daily views.

For advertisers, this opens up more opportunities to reach customers. And in some cases, it can amplify existing campaigns. In a recent study conducted with Nielsen research, we found that promotions perform better together when displayed across multiple screens. In fact, brand recall jumps dramatically to 74 percent for people who saw ads across TV, PC, smartphone and tablets, up from 50 percent for those who just saw ads on TV.

Here are a few ways you can extend your mobile reach with YouTube:

YouTube’s Promoted Video ads on mobile
Do you use Promoted Video ads to reach viewers searching for relevant products and potential customers browsing videos on YouTube.com? You can also use Promoted Videos to reach viewers on the go. Promoted Videos are featured at the top of the video search results on m.youtube.com, YouTube’s mobile platform.

Advertisers pay only when the viewer chooses to watch the video, and all mobile and desktop view counts are summarized into one complete view count on your channel page. Mobile Promoted Video ads are auction-based campaigns that can be managed in your Google AdWords account. All Google AdWords campaigns are opted into “all devices” by default, but creating separate mobile campaigns help optimize your mobile campaigns and performance of your brand channel.

A Promoted Video ad on m.youtube.com includes an ad thumbnail, title and channel name; similar to the organic video results.

Promoted Video ads have recently joined YouTube’s family of TrueView ad formats. Soon, your Promoted Video ads will become TrueView in-search ads and TrueView in-display ads. TrueView in-search ads show up in display ad units against search results on YouTube, whereas TrueView in-display ads show up in display ad units against suggested videos on YouTube and across website content on the Google Display Network. These TrueView video ads can be setup and managed in any Google AdWords for video account and purchased on a cost-per-view basis.

YouTube mobile in-stream ads
YouTube mobile in-stream ads are 15-second pre-roll ads that appear before the video begins to play. Similar to your desktop experience, mobile in-stream ads may show before videos produced by YouTube partners. In addition to the Android YouTube app, in-stream ads are also available to viewers accessing m.youtube.com from their iPhone.

You can optimize your mobile in-stream ads to reach specific audiences, locations and content. In-stream ads are priced on CPM and can be arranged via ad reservation through your Google sales representative.

Animal Planet used mobile in-stream ads to promote the new season of River Monsters.

YouTube mobile roadblocks
YouTube Mobile roadblocks give brands 100% share of voice on the YouTube home, browse and search pages on m.youtube.com. According to recent Nielsen data, these roadblocks add 17 percent incremental impressions for advertisers.

adidas used mobile roadblocks to complement their homepage masthead ad. Using multiple mobile tactics in addition to roadblocks, channel views jumped 26x over the span of their “adidas is all in” brand campaign.

Mobile brand channels extend your online presence
Many advertisers use banners, background images and gadgets to customize their YouTube brand channels. Extend your brand presence to mobile users by creating a customized mobile brand channel. Accessed through m.youtube.com, mobile channels offer the same high level of customization, including the use of gadgets. You can drive traffic to your YouTube mobile brand channel by running ads on the AdMob network or on m.youtube.com.

YouTube’s AdBlitz brand channel features custom-designed elements which engage our growing mobile audience.

For more information about YouTube mobile ads, connect with your Google sales representative or visit www.youtube.com/advertise/mobile.html.

Posted by Nicky Crane, Product Manager

Asia-Pacific: XL Telecom in Indonesia gives a call to Google Mobile Ads

2011-11-16T09:43:00.000-08:00

An extensive archipelago comprised of over 13,000 islands, Indonesia ranks as the world’s fourth most populous country. An important trade region going back to the 7th century, this vibrant slice of Southeast Asia has always presented communication issues because of its unique geographical character and diverse languages.

The dominance of non-electronic delivery in the past has given way to a formidable telecommunications infrastructure that is well suited for this country’s unique needs. Already more than 67% of its citizens sport a mobile device, a statistic which XL Axiata (XL as it’s commonly known)—a dominant provider in the Indonesian telecom field—intends to expand.

XL fully understands its unique market and boasts more than 40 million cellular subscribers and 22,000 cell towers after 15 years of business. Java and Bali, in addition to the nation’s principal cities, have access to data communication, broadband Internet, and mobile communication/4G services.

Promoting across the Google AdMob network
Capitalizing on its strong brand recognition, XL decided to both pursue new customers and solidify current ones with a broad mobile-centric advertising campaign. Using Google’s AdMob network as the advertising conduit, they conducted a 45-day ad campaign consisting of colorful banner ads exhorting viewers to check out promotions and contests. Since the mobile-ads technology is predicated on appearing within user-downloaded websites, XL’s ubiquitous ads popped up on a broad spectrum of apps. After clicking on the various ads, users were directed to a mobile-optimized site for more information.

“Google’s AdMob is already the gold standard in mobile-computing ad strategies here in the Southeast Asian market,” says Tommy Wattimena, SVP Marketing Brand and Communication Deevelopment PT XL Axiata. “We’ve already had tremendous results employing it in our telecom expansion efforts, so it was a no-brainer to use it again as the foundational tool in our latest mobile-marketing campaign.”

With the burgeoning implementation of Google’s mobile ads, text, banner, and media-rich adverts are now an integral facet of the application landscape on smartphones and iPads, and users readily engage with those that catch their interest.

During the month-and-a-half campaign, over 80,000 users were sufficiently intrigued with the banner ads to investigate further, representing a healthy clickthrough rate (CTR) of 1.48%. In addition, 5.4 million impressions were recorded, augmenting XL’s brand awareness.

For XL, employing Google AdMob to drive its latest mobile-advertising campaign was a given since it has proven its merits in previous telecom marketing efforts. “Google mobile ads really come through for us,” says Mr. Wattimena. “They’ve become a standard part of virtually every campaign.”

Posted by Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Manager

Webinar Recap: Making Mobile-Friendly Websites - Best Practices in Action

2011-11-14T15:26:00.000-08:00

Last Thursday, we presented a webinar “Making Mobile-Friendly Websites: Best Practices in Action” on the resources you need to learn about what makes a good mobile site and to start building one. This was part of our broader “GoMo” initiative, which helps businesses “Go Mobile”.

Dai Pham and Sonja Lee of the Google Mobile Ads team presented an overview of the mobile momentum, why mobile sites matter, 10 best practices with full case studies and business examples. They also introduced the tools and resources showcased in HowToGoMo.com to the audience.

The PDF deck can be downloaded here.

For more information about how to mobilize your website, please visit HowToGoMo.com.

Posted by Dai Pham, Google Mobile Ads

Asia-Pacific: Lexus CT City Challenge

2011-11-14T10:14:00.000-08:00

According to the Harvard Business Review, Asia-Pacific is expected by many to constitute half of the world’s economic growth by 2030 1. According to internal Google research, nearly half of the top ten markets for smartphone penetration are in Asia. AdMob requests grew by 500% in Asia Pacific last year, the highest in the world. A rapidly expanding population, upward trending consumer spending and living standards, and significant infrastructure investment all help to make Asia-Pacific a hot market. As such, starting today Google Mobile Ads will focus this next week on Asia-Pacific to help you optimize your Asia strategy for mobile.

About Lexus
Lexus has established a unique place in the automotive world as a manufacturer of premium vehicles. The Lexus brand is synonymous with breathtaking design, innovative technology, heart-stopping performance and environmental sensitivity.
In March 2010, Lexus launched the first luxury hybrid hatch on the Australian market, the CT 200h, reinforcing Lexus’ commitment to innovation. The target audience was people in their late 20s to early 40s, both singles & couples, with a high disposable income and for whom style, design and technology is important.
Lexus’ objective for the CT 200h, launch was threefold:

To drive awareness among the target audience;

To focus messaging on the unique features of the CT 200h, such as the Two Mood-Two mode;

To connect and engage with their audience to drive consideration.

Solution
Among the target audience, smartphone ownership and internet penetration is very high. Subsequently, casual gaming usage is heavy, a typical quote being “When I need something to pass the time, I use Lineup on my iPhone.”
Based on these insights, Lexus, The White Agency (Lexus’ digital agency) and Admob worked together to create The Lexus CT City Challenge -a mobile app that was addictive in nature, held the key product benefits ‘eco’ and ‘sports’ two moode-tow mode at its centre. They also ensured the game is part of the overall CT 200h and F1 strategy, and it was also incentivised with a grand prize of a CT 200h. The digital directive was lead by The White Agency and development of the app by Webling.
The app was created with a young, urban, design and quality-conscious audience in mind, this being the primary target group for the car itself. They are frequent visitors to the Apple iTunes App Store, engaging with and purchasing casual gaming offerings in high quantities.
To build awareness and acquisition of the app, Admob also created a mobile ads campaign..

The Lexus CT City Challenge Game
The game challenges players to take the Lexus CT 200h for a virtual spin around courses modeled after Australia's capital cities. The game features five courses which are progressively unlocked as players achieve qualifying scores. Engagement was incentivised with a live playoff at the Melbourne Motor Show with the winner receiving a brand new Lexus CT 200h
The “Slot Cars” style gameplay demonstrates the unique hybrid “two mood – two mode” feature of the CT 200h. This allows players to switch between ‘Sport’ and ‘Eco’ modes to achieve the best times while saving fuel, culminating in higher scores and positioning on the leader board.
Players can easily broadcast their scores across social media, challenging friends to download the game, or beat their scores/position on the leader board.
The game was developed via a custom 3D engine and features realistic torque physics, particle animation, sound effects and an original music soundtrack, with a stylised look and feel to match the Lexus brand.

The Admob Mobile Ads campaign
The campaign ran from 21st April to 1st June across the Admob network, targeting iPhones, iPads and iPods. Click-to-download banners were displayed on mobile apps such as Words With Friends, Angry Birds, WeatherZone, and various mobile websites. These sent the user through to the iTunes App Store where they could download the app.
A burst strategy was employed to upweight investment at strategic intervals to help the app rise up the iTunes ranks in order to achieve higher vis
ibility and gain more organic downloads.

Results
● Won “Best mobile advertising campaign” at the 2011 Mobile Marketing Awards.
● Total time played (all players): 1,138:46:83 (hh:mm:ss)
● Average number of plays per user: 5.01
● Most number of plays by a single user: 131
● CTR:1.03%
● Downloads peaked 2 weeks after the campaign launch. A 2nd peak occurred during the last week of the campaign
● Highest Ranks in iTunes Store achieved during the campaign
○ Racing: 5th
○ Game: 76th
○ Overall 168th

Quote from Julie Hutchinson, CRM & Interactive Marketing Manager, Lexus Australia
"For the launch of the Lexus CT200h we wanted to reach out to a new demographic, a younger audience in their late 20s to 40s. The Lexus CT City Challenge mobile campaign was the perfect way to achieve this objective. It created a sense of excitement and innovation around the Lexus brand and kept this demographic engaged with the car and the brand."

1Harvard Business Review, April 2010

Posted by Ryan Hayward, Product Marketing Manager

An update on mobile optimization in ads quality

2011-11-10T15:09:00.000-08:00

In September, we announced that mobile site optimization would soon become a new factor in ads quality for all campaigns running mobile search traffic. This past week, we introduced GoMo, an initiative to help businesses “Go Mobile” by giving them tools and resources to build a website that works well on smartphones. Today, we want to let you know that this new factor in mobile ads quality will be rolling out to all advertisers. Ads that have mobile optimized landing pages will tend to perform better in AdWords -- they will generally drive more mobile traffic at a lower cost.

The AdWords system will automatically visit your landing page, and evaluate your site as viewed by smartphones. However, if you already have a mobile site, we recommend confirming with your webmaster that you’ve configured your server to show the mobile-optimized site when the AdWords mobile User-Agent is detected.

We encourage you see what your mobile customers see. Visit your website on a smartphone or in the “GoMoMeter” preview tool on HowToGoMo.com. The GoMoMeter will analyze your site and give you customized recommendations on how to make your site more mobile friendly to customers. If you don’t have a mobile site, but are interested in getting started, please check out best practices and the directory of vendors HowToGoMo.com.

Posted by David Nachum, Product Manager, Mobile Ads

GoMo: How we mobile-optimized our own mobile ads website

2011-11-09T08:00:00.000-08:00

Recently we launched GoMo, an initiative to help businesses learn how to build sites that work well on mobile phones. As we were working on this project, we thought it was a great opportunity to apply the knowledge we had gained to our own site. Today, we’re delighted to announce the mobile-friendly version of Google Mobile Ads, which you can take for a spin at google.com/mobileads on your mobile device.

In addition to practicing what we’re preaching, there were important reasons to build a mobile site. Use of the mobile web is accelerating and there are now 96 million smartphones in use in the US.[1] That number becomes much more tangible through the lens of your own analytics data. When we looked at our site, we observed a rapid increase in mobile visits over the past year. Today, nearly 10% of overall traffic to our Mobile Ads website comes from mobile devices. That’s hard to ignore.

We realized that our mobile users were having a really poor experience when accessing the desktop site via a mobile phone. Furthermore, we were wasting 10% of our efforts in marketing the site. Again, the data didn’t lie: the site’s bounce rate from mobile devices was above 60%, more than double the bounce rate from desktop users. Clearly something was up.

How did we do it? I sat down with a webmaster here at Google - Jerome Senaillat - and together we shaped the content and features that would work best on mobile. The process was surprisingly quick: we had a near-final working version of the site in just four weeks, without working on the project full time. We followed this list of ten best practices when designing the site, focusing on three which would greatly improve the experience for a mobile user:

Design for visibility: the problem with the homepage was that none of the content could be read without causing eyestrain. The solution was drastic: we abandoned the images on the homepage and replaced it with an easy-to-read, simple-to-navigate menu.
Keep it quick: using our analytics data we were able to identify the most popular content consumed by mobile users on our desktop site - such as our mobile insights page - and made it quick to access from the homepage of the mobile site.
Make it easy to convert: a primary goal of our site is drive people to try mobile ads by creating an AdWords account. We optimized that experience for mobile users by connecting them to a call center where an advisor can create the account on the fly. We set up a separate phone number to track calls.

We’re excited about the early results we’ve seen since launch. Already, we’ve noticed that mobile users are staying on the site twice as long as they did before.

Jerome and I recorded a short video to explain what we did in a bit more detail, you can check it out below. It was easy to GoMo and we hope you’ll GoMo too!

Posted by Mike Schipper, Google Mobile Ads Marketing

[1] CTIA, October 12, 2011.

Re-thinking Mobile Marketing & Analytics webinar recording featuring Avinash Kaushik

2011-11-08T15:55:00.000-08:00

Missed the Think Mobile webinar on Nov. 2nd? The recording is now available on the Google Business Channel on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrTiyAMTQ_g

In this video, Avinash Kaushik (http://www.kaushik.net/avinash) shares some best practices mobile marketing strategies, and points out some strategies that you should beware of. He also shares a framework for bringing fast, innovative measurement to your mobile data (including a special downloadable report).

Posted by Kevin Otsuka, Associate Product Marketing Manager, Mobile Ads

GoMo: TicketsNow sees a 100% spike in mobile sales after launching a mobile-optimized site

2011-11-08T09:09:00.000-08:00

TicketsNow is an online marketplace where fans of live events can buy and sell tickets. With the knowledge that 25% of Google queries for tickets comes from mobile devices, it became clear that TicketsNow needed a solution for their customers to quickly and easily purchase tickets while on the go.

TicketsNow were excited to invest in a mobile-optimized site that was transaction ready so they could be there for fans at the very moment they wanted tickets. A small team of in-house developers quickly had a version up and running. They aligned their search strategy at the same time, and created separate mobile campaigns in AdWords to direct people to the site.

The response from customers was enthusiastic: the conversion rate for ticket sales increased by 50% and mobile sales doubled. ‘We wanted to cover the cost of building the mobile site using the margin generated by incremental sales from Google mobile paid search. We are right on track to achieve that,’ said Sachin Gadhvi, TicketsNow’s director of search and mobile marketing.

Watch the video case study to learn all the details of how Ticketsnow achieved their goals. You can also download a PDF summary of the case study here.

Your business can ‘GoMo’ too! Learn more at www.howtogomo.com.

Posted by: Mike Schipper, Google Mobile Ads Marketing

Making mobile friendly websites: webinar invitation

2011-11-07T14:16:00.001-08:00

Do you know what your customers are experiencing when they see your website on their mobile phones? With today’s customers constantly on mobile devices, it’s important that your website is mobile-ready. We believe that the most important thing that your business or client can do to grow their business using mobile is to create a mobile-friendly website.

As you’ve probably seen from this blog, we launched an initiative called GoMo that helps businesses “Go Mobile”, and would like to invite you to an upcoming webinar where we'll show you the resources you need to learn about what makes a good mobile site and to start building one.

Join us to learn more about:

Why mobile sites matter
Using the GoMoMeter to test your site’s mobile-readiness
10 elements of good mobile site design
Illustrated examples and case studies of companies Going Mobile
Resources to help you get started building a mobile-friendly website

Details are as follows:
When: Thursday, November 10th 2011 11:00am PST, 2:00pm EST
Where: This webinar will be held on WebEx. Click here to register, or visit http://goo.gl/uL6Dv

Are you ready to learn more about how to 'GoMo'? Sign up for our webinar today.

Posted by Dai Pham, Google Mobile Ads Marketing

Bringing the DoubleClick Ad Exchange to AdMob publishers

2011-11-07T10:50:00.001-08:00

We are evolving our mobile advertising products to help advertisers and publishers benefit from the best of AdMob and Google. Last year, we enabled AdMob app publishers to have access to AdWords advertisers when an AdMob ad was not available.

We’re pleased to announce another milestone in the process of bringing our offerings together. Over the next several weeks, a small handful of Google certified ad networks will now be able to compete for publishers’ unfilled AdMob in-app inventory through the DoubleClick Ad Exchange. The DoubleClick Ad Exchange launched in 2009 as a way to simplify the process of buying and selling display advertising. In the two years since then, exchange-based trading has taken off -- we’ve seen the volume of trades on our own exchange grow by more than 150% in the past year.

Beginning in a few weeks, ad networks will compete in an auction along with AdWords advertisers, and the highest paying ad will show on a publisher’s in-app inventory. More buyers like demand-side platforms and agency trading desks will help increase demand for ad inventory and help developers and publishers make more money. For more information about this change, have a look at our post on the Official DoubleClick Blog.

For publishers currently using AdSense to improve fill rate, the Google certified ad networks will begin competing along with AdWords advertisers in the coming weeks. Publishers must take action by selecting “Do not use Google AdSense” in their account settings if they want to disable ads from AdWords and Google certified ad networks. Please visit the Helpcenter for more details.

Posted by Vishay Nihalani, Product Manager, Google Mobile Ads