#Mobile Ads

Industry staples like display, video, and OTT have been in place for some years, but there’s a looming shadow on the horizon; a massive media powerhouse that has only begun to dip its toes into everything digital advertising has to offer: gaming. No longer a niche medium, video games have gone mainstream and reach a worldwide audience of 3.32 billion players. A recent report from Comscore highlights just how large and diverse the gaming audience has become; it’s not just kids playing games these days.

Let’s talk about TikTok. You may love it, you may hate it, or you may just be confused. This video app grew to popularity in early 2020 and had its fair share of controversy. But there’s no doubt about it—TikTok is one of the most-used mobile apps ever. It’s addictively fun, with an algorithm that can predict exactly what kind of video you’ll most enjoy. But does that mean you need a TikTok account, and most importantly, do you need to advertise there?

Rumors spiked this past week over Meta and the possibility they could remove Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook from the European Union, as issues over red-tape, regulations, and data arise. Meta released a report recently that explained the reasons for their possible withdrawal from the EU. According to AdWeek, the European regulators are working on legislation to establish how EU citizens’ data will be transferred to the U.S. while withdrawing from a major market is an extreme outcome, this is a reminder that marketers should not put all their eggs in one basket.

Where were you on October 4, 2021? If you own a smartphone or keep up with the news, you’ll remember that at the beginning of this month, Facebook “broke down” for more than 5 hours. And it wasn’t just Facebook—the breakdown included their apps, Instagram and Whatsapp, and even some of their office building software, leaving Facebook employees locked outside for hours. Maybe you barely noticed and went on with your day.

Consumers have grown increasingly accustomed to using their mobile devices to research products and make purchases, spending a large portion of their day using their phones. On average, smartphone users in 2019 spent three and a half hours per day on their mobile devices, with nearly a third of users reporting near continual time spent online. At the same time, the number of U.S. adults owning a smartphone has rapidly grown, from 35% in 2011 to 85% in 2021.

With the release of iOS 14, Apple is making yet another big privacy-focused upgrade to iOS. One where users can choose to hide their device’s ID from apps so it can’t be tracked. Something many advertisers, particularly Facebook, aren’t happy about. But despite the uproar of Facebook and a handful of other social giants, there are certain programmatic advertising platforms who aren’t bothered by the privacy news at all. Why?

When the pandemic forced billions of people to stay home earlier this year, over-the-top (OTT) media skyrocketed as consumers began streaming more video content than ever before. This wasn’t entirely surprising, though. With video streaming revenue expected to grow to $30.4 billion by 2024, OTT has been a marketing go-to for several years. But there’s an often-overlooked OTT video platform that’s held strong and steady despite the turbulence of 2020, and continues to climb even still: mobile video ads.

During this time of COVID-19, our portable devices have been somewhat of a lifeline to the outside world, as so many people have been ordered to stay in place during the global pandemic. Needless to say, this has brought about increased mobile use. In other words, the time spent on our smartphones and tablets has risen drastically. Changes in mobile use Over the past year, some of these trends were expected, and were already manifesting themselves before the global pandemic hit the U.