Mobile Ads need to improve to justify increasing spend

Chart of the Day: Mobile ad spend continues to skyrocket, but customer perceptions of mobile ads are still in the doldrums

Armani don't do infomercials. Rolex doesn't do direct mail. Ralph Lauren don't do coupons. Why do they ignore these often successful marketing tactics? Because if you put your ad for Rolex watches on a crappy leaflet and shove it through someone's door it degrades the brand. It detracts from it's luxury, it's exclusivity.

The lesson is that it's not just the content of the ad that matters. The medium it's delivered in matters.

This should make marketers wary about rushing head long into mobile ads when customers are reporting so many issues with them.

There's no doubting that such a rush is occurring. Spending on mobile ads doubled in just two years - and will reach an impressive 143 billion this year according to Statista.

And yet studies from Celtra and Forrester show that consumers are all too often not impressed by the ads they're being served.

The fact that 60% of clicks on mobile banner ads are by accident should be shocking. The fact that it's not really that surprising probably says a lot about the state of the mobile ad industry.

Customers aren't happy with the ads they're seeing either. Most complain they obscure the content, and 71% say the majority of ads they see are disrupting their experience. Of course, all ads disrupt consumers to some extent, but on the small screen of mobile devices, it's hard to create an effective ad which isn't just annoying customers by getting in the way.

The massive growth of mobile means there is always going to be a large demand for mobile ads, but marketers need to get far better at delivering those ads in a way that does not detract from their brand by annoying their customers.

• Source: OnDevice, Celtra, Forrester, Retale and Statista.
• Recommended Toolkit: Digital Branding Toolkit