1. Q3 2013
The State of Mobile Advertising
Insights from Opera Mediaworks
the world’s largest mobile ad platform
13,000
60 BILLION
sites & applications
ad impressions per month
Publishers include …
400 MILLION
global consumers reached
In the third quarter of 2013, we witnessed three main trends:
Growth
Traditionally, mobile web activity tapers in the middle of the summer, but, this year, we saw
steady growth. We attribute this to growth from the international markets in which we operate.
Advertisers include …
Mobile publisher categories broaden and segment
In the past, a handful of site categories clearly dominated in terms of mobile ad revenue; now,
a much wider range of site categories are successfully monetizing their inventory. And, within
some categories, we’re seeing more segmentation. Within the Sports category, for example,
we see significantly different engagement profiles among sports-specific sites.
On one hand, the device market has coalesced into two operating systems: iOS and Android.
Yet, these two systems are becoming more diversified by the increasing number of releases,
each with different capabilities and often with different user demographics.
As with past reports, we continue with this edition to share data around mobile ad traffic and
monetization by device, geography and publisher category.
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
1

2. The State of Mobile Advertising
iPhone and Android are neck and
neck in race for smartphone dominance
OS / device
Overall, iOS remains the clear leader in both impressions served and in monetization,
capturing 44.4% of all ad requests and nearly 50% of all revenue on our platform.
% of revenue
Android
27.73%
Phone
30.32%
27.27%
Tablet
1.00%
0.46%
44.40%
49.53%
iPhone
31.00%
36.39%
iPad
8.87%
10.33%
iPod Touch
4.53%
2.80%
RIM
2.84%
4.33%
Symbian
4.73%
1.21%
Windows
0.36%
0.34%
Other
However, in the case of impressions served, this lead is based on the success of the iPad.
When comparing just the iPhone to Android smartphones, the difference is less than one
percentage point (31% vs. 30.3%).
31.32%
16.35%
16.86%
iOS
It is worth noting that the iPad and other tablet devices continue to become more important
to mobile advertising. Together, iPad and Android tablets make up almost 10% of all
impressions served. One year ago (Q3 2012), tablets accounted for just 5% of total
impressions.
iOS
Android
Other
Symbian
RIM
Windows
44.40%
31.32%
16.35%
4.73%
2.84%
0.36%
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
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3. The State of Mobile Advertising
OS Share
Toward the end of the quarter, Apple made its latest operating system version
available to users, and, in just a few short weeks, iOS 7 became the dominant OS
version for Apple devices. Still, more than a third of Apple users continue to use
older versions of the OS.
OS
OS version
% users
Android
2.99%
26.11%
19.76%
The Android OS has more pronounced diversification of its version usage, with
over 50% of the Android user base operating without the newest software.
49.77%
1.37%
iOS
0.60%
1.96%
Tablet
3.33%
33.01%
61.09%
0.01%
Android
iOS
iOS
1.37%
2.99%
26.11%
19.76%
49.77%
0.60%
1.96%
3.33%
33.01%
61.09%
.01%
Other
Froyo
Gingerbread
Ice Cream
Sandwich
Jelly Bean
OS 3
OS 4
OS 5
OS 6
OS 7
other
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
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4. The State of Mobile Advertising
Music, Video & Media slides back to no. 1
for impression volume and revenue generation
% of revenue
% of impressions
The Music, Video & Media category is now the consistent leader in ad impression volume and this
month leads in overall monetization. Sports, which rose to #1 in monetization last quarter, has now
dropped to third. Business, Finance & Investing is still producing the highest revenue per impression.
Mu
,V
u r
M
E
a
r
a
r
Site category
N
I f r a
Ar
E
ra
Ga
Music, Video & Media
r
Computers & Electronics
H a
Social
u
F a
Other
News & Information
Arts & Entertainment
Games
Sports
Health, Fitness & Self Help
Business, Finance & Investing
0
7.25
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
14.5
21.75
29
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5. The State of Mobile Advertising
Game schedules, seasons impact mobile traffic and engagement
Even though it has dropped out of our top spot for monetization, the Sports
category has shown impressive growth over the last year. It also shows
significant variations in traffic (as measured by ad requests) and engagement
(as measured by click-through rates). For instance, we can see that traffic
peaks on weekends, but engagement is higher towards the end of the
workweek.
Why is this? Within the category, there are multiple sub-divisions by type of
sport, and each has its own regular season game schedule. American football
games mostly take place over the weekend while baseball and hockey games
are spread throughout the week, thus creating different traffic patterns.
DOW traffic vs engagement
“Sports”
“In Season” traffic by DOW
M
T
W
Th
F
Sa
Su
% of ad requests
Requests
CTR
% of ad requests
0.3
0.25
0.2
Football
0.15
Baseball
0.1
Hockey
0.05
0
M
T
W
Th
F
Sa
Su
Each sport, too, has its own season, which creates enormous fluctuations
throughout the annual cycle. Traffic to sport-specific content can drop in excess
of 90% when a sport goes into its “off” season.
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
5

6. The State of Mobile Advertising
How is a baseball fan different from a hockey fan?
Hockey (in season)
We also see varying contextual parameters among the
different sports. While both baseball and hockey fans
seem to prefer iPhone over Android, nearly 6 out of 10
baseball fans use iPhones compared to about half of
hockey fans, and they are also more likely to have an
iPad (13.2% vs. 5%).
The types of ads being served to these two types of
users are also different. For the campaigns we
analyzed, advertising for automobiles and automotive
products seems to be a consistent winner no
matter the sport or season, though it monopolizes
almost twice the share of impressions on hockey
properties as compared with baseball.
OS / device
Baseball (in season)
OS / device
Android
30.67%
Android
21.96%
iOS
62.63%
iOS
74.57%
iPhone
50.91%
iPhone
58.51%
iPad
4.97%
iPad
13.20%
iPod Touch
6.74%
iPod Touch
2.86%
Other
6.71%
Other
3.47%
Baseball fans see more ads for personal finance
products, insurance and electronics than hockey
fans do. Ads for entertainment services and sports
content and equipment are targeted more to
hockey fans — in fact, about 1 in 4 impressions
on hockey sites and apps are for a sports brand,
and for the campaigns analyzed, 43% of revenue
for hockey publishers comes from Entertainment
advertisers.
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
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7. The State of Mobile Advertising
Ad requests and impression volume continue to grow worldwide
Consistent with previous quarters, the United States is driving the majority of ad requests and
revenue on the Opera Mediaworks platform — but this lead continues to shrink as international
volume increases. Last quarter the U.S. share of requests was 48.9%, while now it is 47.5% of
our total volume.
Top 20 countries
United States
United Kingdom
Indonesia
India
Italy
Canada
Russian Federation
7.33%
15.25%
Mexico
4.56%
2.82%
1.64%
20.90%
Africa
Middle East
South Africa
Saudi Arabia
Spain
Germany
Australia
France
Turkey
Asia Pacific
47.50%
Brazil
Europe
Nigeria
Americas (non-U.S.)
United States
Oceania
Malaysia
Japan
Vietnam
© Copyright 2013, Opera Mediaworks. All rights reserved.
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