People are now consuming more content in mobile apps than ever before, with a new study by analytics enterprise comScore showing that half of digital media time is spent on smartphones. The new figure is a significant increase compared to 12 months ago and dwarfs the share for desktop.
The latest data from comScore highlights just how important mobile is becoming for advertisers, publishers and brands in order to attract leads, prospects and contacts. While cross-platform is still an important consideration for content, digital time is becoming more skewed to mobile and apps, so publishers should take this into consideration.
Smartphone apps now account for 50 per cent of digital time spend, which is way ahead of desktop (32 per cent), tablet apps (nine per cent) and smartphone web (seven per cent). Despite a move away from desktop, the platform is still key for online conversions due to the fact that many brands haven’t embraced mobile and still deliver a lacklustre end-user experience.
Mobile blocking
A separate study by Blockmetry has also lifted the lid on the use of ad blocking, and unfortunately for advertisers, it continues to grow. Blockmetry’s regular “weather report” revealed that worldwide, ad blocking for page views has now reached 32.4 per cent compared to 5.2 per cent for analytics blocking.
Ad blocking remains more of an issue on mobile despite there being less page views and traffic on these devices. In Germany, France and the UK, around a third of page views were impacted by ad blocking during August. South Asia currently has the highest percentage for blocked views at 44.2 per cent, while the US is at the lower end of the spectrum with 31.5 per cent of measured pages for the month.
When looking at the bigger picture, the shift to mobile apps is unlikely to affect advertisers in regards to ad blocking because apps is much less common than smartphone and tablet web. However, the fact that many users are consuming content in a smaller concentration of mobile apps may make it more difficult for brands and businesses to reach and engage with consumers on a regular basis.
