Android campaigns bought through Madison, Adfonic’s Demand-side Platform (DSP) were significantly more popular among advertisers than in Q3.
Android’s share of impressions increased by 44% from Q3, to reach 46% overall, while Apple’s iOS lost 24% of its Q3 share, to achieve 48% of impressions, just 2% ahead of Android.
Adfonic also found that Style & Fashion campaigns experienced a huge surge in impressions, increasing from 0.5% of Adfonic’s global platform in Q3 to 7% in Q4. In addition, ad requests from premium publishers through RTB reached the four billion mark, suggesting the emergence of an exponential growth curve as larger numbers of premium app developers and publishers make their inventory available via RTB exchanges.
Advertisers turn to Android
Android campaigns bought through Adfonic’s mobile DSP, called Madison, were significantly more popular among advertisers in Q4 2013 than in Q3.
In Q3 2013, Android campaigns accounted for 32% of all impressions across Adfonic’s global platform. In Q4, this rose to 46%, representing a 44% increase in impressions share. Meanwhile, in Q3, iOS took a huge 63% of impressions but this shrank to 48% in Q4, meaning a 24% reduction in impressions share and leaving Android and iOS virtually neck-and-neck.
Victor Malachard, Adfonic’s CEO and co-founder, commented: “Android phones are now truly rivalling iOS in virtually every specification, from performance to screen size – just look for example at the number of reviews comparing the Nexus 5 favourably with the iPhone 5s. This enables Android phones to show immersive, engaging formats such as rich media and video as readily as Apple devices, and advertisers are realising this by investing more heavily in Android-targeted campaigns.
He continued: “We are also encouraged to see the continuation of the exponential growth curve for premium ad requests via RTB, which we first saw in Q3. More premium mobile publishers attracted to the efficiency and reduced risk of Real-time Bidding makes more inventory available for powerful DSPs such as Madison, which employ big data and smart algorithms to deliver the right ad to the right audience – that’s a win-win for advertisers and publishers alike.”
Premium publications through RTB hit four billion requests
In Q3 2013 Adfonic looked at volumes of supply come through premium publications traded through the RTB exchanges, accessed via Madison, its mobile DSP. It found significant quarter-on-quarter increases, with the number of requests rising from 342 million requests in Q4 2012, to nearly two billion by Q3 2013, and predicted that this rate of growth would see around four billion requests in Q4 2013 through its single buying point.
This proved an accurate prediction, with ad requests hitting 3.8 billion in Q4, implying a possibly exponential growth of premium publications traded through RTB as publishers increasingly realise the benefits of making their inventory available for programmatic buying.
Style & Fashion skyrocket
Style & Fashion campaigns experienced a huge surge in impressions in Q4 2013. Advertising spending increased from 0.5% of Adfonic’s global platform in Q3 2013, to 7% in Q4, possibly reflecting the propensity of style and fashion retailers to invest in mobile advertising over the festive period.
The Style & Fashion verticals also showed other interesting properties in Q4. It was by quite some distance the most popular vertical for clickthroughs at night-time, approaching a CTR index of 2.0 between 12am and 6am but showing fewer clicks throughout the rest of the day. It showed a similarly biased profile throughout the week, with many clicks from Monday to Wednesday and fewer later in the week. Clearly Style & Fashion campaigns were well suited to the small hours towards the beginning of the working week.
About the Adfonic Global AdMetrics Report
The Adfonic Global AdMetrics Report pulls data from Adfonic’s smarter buying platform to provide actionable insights to inform campaign planning and optimise performance.
The report, available as a PDF from Adfonic’s website, covers global narratives, with at-a-glance insights into the top mobile advertising channels, verticals, devices, platforms and brands across Adfonic’s platform, plus demographics, inventory shares and performance data.
For more information on the Adfonic Global AdMetrics Report, click here
