Mobile Internet Engagement and Ad Clickthroughs Out of Sync
- The speed at which the site loads
- The ease of navigation on the site
- The quality of the content on the site itself
Among mobile Internet users, several small but telling differences were revealed when comparing smartphone owners to feature phone owners, says the report:
- Both groups prioritized the speed at which a mobile site loads,
- Smartphone users looked next at the quality of the content, ranking ease of navigation as less important
- Feature phone users found ease of navigation almost as essential as their number one concern, how fast the mobile site loads.
Mobile Web site features that had the least impact on a users decision to make a return visit were the absence of advertising, the ability to personalize, and the number of links, videos or images on the site. Publishers will likely welcome the news that the presence of advertising on a site does not lessen its appeal, concludes the study.
Joy Liuzzo, Director of Marketing and Mobile Research. “Mobile advertising presents a unique opportunity to take advantage of high engagement levels and less clutter on the pages… advertisers enjoy a large share of voice per page since there is often only one advertisement on the page and it takes up more screen space… ”
And, an almost concurrent study by Chitika of mobile vs. non-mobile Internet usage, based on a sample of 93 million impressions, mobile users are approximately half as likely to click on an advertisement as non-mobile users. Non-mobile held an 0.83% clickthrough rate, while mobile as a whole pulled a mere 0.48% – just over half of the average.
It appears, given the numbers, that mobile users are not receptive to advertising. This phenomenon that is not surprising, concludes the report, given the mobile users’ propensity to be searching for quick answers or directions.
Of the five major smartphone operating systems, iPhone ranked the worst for clickthrough rate at 0.30%. iPhone also accounted for the bulk of mobile hits, at 66%. The group which clicked on ads the most is the “Other” group, comprised mainly of BlackBerry users and a small handful of other phone operating systems (including Symbian, Nokia, and HTC).
| Mobile Internet Browsing & Clickthroughs | ||
| Smartphone Systems | % Hits | Clickthrough Rate (% of browsing, rounded) |
| iPhone |
66% |
0.30% |
| Other |
24 |
0.92 |
| Windows CE |
2 |
0.61 |
| Palm |
2 |
0.89 |
| Android |
6 |
0.45 |
| Total Mobile |
|
0.48 |
| Source: Chatika, September 2009 | ||
The clickthrough rates, says the report, are certainly lower than expected, given the industry’s general consensus that mobile users are more likely to click ads. Possibly, concludes the study, because the ads displayed on mobile devices are the same as the ones displayed to non-mobile, rather than comparing standard online advertising with mobile-oriented ads.
However, concludes the report, though “… (though) mobile accidental clicks are more relevant than in non-mobile ad serving, it appears that mobile Internet users are disinterested in advertising at an extremely high rate… ”
To review the Chitika report, please visit here, and to read the InsightExpress release in its entirety, please go here.
You are receiving this newsletter at <email removed> as part of your free membership with MediaPost. If this issue was forwarded to you and you would like to begin receiving a copy of your own, please visit our site – www.mediapost.com – and click on [subscribe] in the e-newsletter box.
For advertising opportunities see our online media kit. If you’d rather not receive this newsletter in the future click here. 
We welcome and appreciate forwarding of our newsletters in their entirety or in part with proper attribution.
(c) 2009 MediaPost Communications, 1140 Broadway, 4th Floor, New York, NY 10001
