mobile app formats final

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2011 Interactive Advertising Bureau

Prevailing Mobile In-ApplicationAdvertising Formats

Version 2, rele ased 22 M arch 2011


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PreVailing Mobile in-aPPlication adVertis ing ForMats

1 Lookou t an alysis rep orte d in C NET, Fe b. 16, 2011. http ://reviews.cne t.com/8301-13970_7-20032228-78.html

Prepared by the Mobile Advertising Committee of the Interactive Advertising Bureau

Introduction

Since the IAB released the first version of this study in July 2010, the mobile application (app)market has only continued to grow and diversify, with new devices, operating systems, and screendimensions further increasing the already exciting (and bewildering) possibilities for publishers and

marketers looking to reach consumers on mobile or portable devices. The 350,000 apps in the AppleApp Store, and 150,000 in the Android Marketplace1 clearly underscore publishers rapid embraceof the app as a way to deliver content, and by extension advertisers opportunity to deliver messagesto an engaged audience on a burgeoning medium.

Much remains unsettled and uncertain in the realm of apps. The industry is in the midst of thoughtfuland exciting conversations around topics like whether the long-term future is going to be morebrowser-based versus app-based, and whether tablets are mobile devices or something else entirely.Regardless of the long-term outcome of these debates, for the short term, apps will remain animportant way that mobile consumers access information and services.

This second iteration of the IABs Prevailing In-App Ad Formats study will highlight some of thechanges we observe in ad sizes from July of last year to January of 2011 based on a survey of ad

formats currently being sold by IAB publisher and ad network members. As before, the sample size ofparticipating publishers is small; however, for several of the app platforms included, we are able tomake inferences about market developments.

We hope that publishers planning to launch or relaunch apps look at the sizes outlined here, and thinkabout their relative prevalence when planning their ad offerings. Marketers hoping to make sense of arather chaotic landscape can also hopefully find some guidance in the ongoing results of this study.


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2 Dimensions in this report are given in pixels, width first, i.e., 300x250 means 300 pixels wide by 250 pixels high. For IAB Ad Un it Guidelinessee http://www.iab.net/iab_products_and_industry_services/508676/508767/Ad_Unit.

Methodology

The IAB fielded a brief survey to members who sell in-app ads, asking them to list the ad formats theycurrently support, across nine platforms for mobile/portable devices.

aPP PlatForMs included

Android-Smartphones Android-Tablets Blackberry iOS-iPad iOS-Pre Retina Display

iOS-Retina Display Palm/HPs WebOS Symbian Windows Phone 7

Twelve IAB member companies responded with ad formats they support:

ParticiPating Publishers

4INFO AccuWeather Associated Press IGN JumpTap NBC Universal Digital Media

Pandora Time Inc. Univision Wall Street Journal Digital Weather Channel Interactive Whitepages.com

A summary table showing the ad size data by OS platform, is included as an appendix to thisdocument. Based on the data, we note a few overarching points that may help guide the market.

Points of Commonality

300x250: One size to unite them all

The data suggest that one ad size seems nearly universal, fitting on all screens and offered bypublishers across most OS platforms: the workhorse 300x250 IAB Medium Rectangle.2 300x250sare small on a modern PC screen, and smallish on a tablet, but theyre about half-screen-size ona 320x480 smartphone. Their familiarity to agencies and publishers alike may make them acomfortable choice of ad size amid many others that are unique to the in-app ad universe.


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Figure 1: 300x250 ad running in Weather Channels iPad application (Source: Weather.com)

iPad ads go every which way

The first IAB in-app ad survey went in field mere months after the iPad hit the market, and so we

were not able to say much about ad sizes for that platform. Today, as the iPad approaches its firstanniversary, the conclusion based on this survey is that there arent yet any dominant in-app iPad adformats. Indeed, although this survey included only 12 publishers, those companies reported a total of35 distinct ad sizes. This compares with about 15 distinct ad sizes for iPad in the July 2010 data.

This diversity across a small sample size gives us pause; we wonder just how many custom or uniquesizes exist throughout the market as a whole.

Two IAB web standard ad sizes do appear to have some traction, or at least a presence acrossmultiple publishers: 728x90s and (as previously mentioned) 300x250s. We strongly believe thatnew and highly effective ad sizes and formats will emerge for tablets, but it seems that publishersright now are seeking a balance between unique, made-for-tablet ad sizes and sizes that hearkenback to established standards from the Web.


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Retina display support is so far limited for participating publishers. In the past year iOSdevices shifted from the screen resolution of the original iPhone/iPod Touch, 320x480, to Applesretina display, screen resolution of 640x960. Although these devices have been on the market foreight months, only one publisher participating in this survey offers an ad size specifically for them,a 640x100 banner. Even publishers that have launched Retina Display-optimized apps continue tosupport ads designed for the lower resolution screens. We expect this will change as the relativecomposition of legacy iOS devices versus retina display devices shifts in the market (and of course a

similar evolution is happening with Android devices, as new and better displays become the norm forthose manufacturers).

A few landscape banners, and landscape pre-roll. In the first edition of this report, we notedthat no publisher offered a landscape-oriented banner. We predicted that would change, and indeedit has, at least in a limited way, with publishers offering expandable 1024x66 and 1024x90 sizes foriPads. One publisher is selling 480x320 (landscape) pre-roll video ads on iOS devices. And ApplesiAd (not included in the survey) also includes landscape banners for iPhones and iPads (480x32 and1024x66, respectively).

Rich media ads expand in a variety of sizes. iOS expandable ad sizes are a pretty good proxyfor sizes available for Android and WebOS devices. For iPhones, participants in this study reported 4main expandable sizes: 300x50, expands to 300x250; and 320x50 expands to either 250, 300, or

480 pixels. The 300x50->300x250 and the 320x50->320x480 showed slightly more prevalencethan the other two formats on iOS devices. Well be continuing to watch this area in future surveys,but if the industry gravitates to four main options for expandables, that does not seem excessive forpublishers or agencies.

Figure 3: Expandable ad: 320x50 expanded to 320x480 (Source: 4INFO).


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Figure 4: Expandable ad: 300x50 expanded to 300x300 (Source: AccuWeather)

File weights continue to show great variation. While some publishers hew closely to theMMAs standards for file weights for their smartphone banners, another camp increasingly seemsto allow 30-40KB files, for rich media and static ads on smartphones and tablets. For rich media thishigher weight makes sense. US mobile data networks evolving from 3G to 4G will increasingly easilysupport these file sizes, although it behooves publishers to continue quality assurance programs to

make certain that ad loading does not negatively impact app performance.

In-App Advertising Recommendations

As with the first edition of this report, we asked IAB members if they had any advice or emerging bestpractices for in-app advertising. We offer the following as food for thought for marketers consideringadding in-app ads to their broader marketing strategies in 2011.

Its not the click that counts. Clicks to mobile landing pages are just the tip of the iceberg ofwhat you can do (and measure) with mobile ad campaigns. Interactions, shares, likes, texts, calls,stores located, apps downloaded, views, coupon redemptions, and impressions, are all possiblesuccess metrics--and nearly everything is measurable. The click became a key metric on the Web

mainly because it was simple and universal. But in most cases its a poor indicator of success.Marketers need to be wary of defaulting to clicks and clickthrough rates for in-app campaigns justbecause thats the easy, familiar thing to dothere are better, richer metrics that will provide farmore insight.

Think audience not device. Publishers and mobile ad networks say they still sometimes seemarketers start with a specific device (often a hot new one) in mind and attempting to design acampaign to suit the device. In most cases this is a mistake. As with all aspects of media planning, itsfar more important to consider the message youre conveying, and especially who you are trying toreach, and plan your mobile strategy accordingly. By highlighting ad formats that facilitate in-appad campaigns that can reach across multiple devices, operating systems, and publishers, we hopethis project helps planners understand that they really can think audience first, device second.


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Look beyond the rectangle. In-app ads already encompass a whole range of creativepossibilities, including sponsorships, interstitials, audio ads, and video commercials. Marketersshould explore the full sweep of options to figure out what will fit best with and complement moststrongly their larger campaign goals.

Further IAB In-App Initiatives

In-app advertising plays a major role in the IABs Mobile Marketing Center of Excellence strategy for2011. In addition to fielding a third iteration of the survey and updating this document later this year,the following initiatives are on our plan, and will likely be of interest to readers of this document:

In-app ad measurement guidelines. The IAB, Mobile Marketing Association, and MediaRating Council have finalized guidelines for mobile web ad measurement. Working with those sameinstitutions, we plan to launch a project to extend the mobile web guidelines to apply to in-app adsas well. This will bring greater accountability and certainty to the metrics that marketers rely on.

Tablet ad creative showcase. We have asked IAB members and others to send us examples ofexciting, innovative, and beautiful creative executions theyve done on tablet devices in the pastyear. We plan to launch a section of iab.net to showcase these, in hopes of creating excitement andinspiring great work on this transformative platform.

An ongoing industry dialog on in-app ads. This document is meant to guide the industryidentifying ad formats that are gaining traction in the marketplace. In addition, the IAB envisionsholding educational events and webinars highlighting research, case studies, and other learning tohelp participants in the industry understand how the market is evolving.

Effectiveness, not just popularity. At least one IAB member has wondered whether thisdocument could evolve to address how well these various ad sizes work, in addition to simply howprevalent they are in the marketplace. This project has assumed that popularity at least in partreflects effectiveness. However, the IAB will talk with members and vendors this year about ways tobegin assessing not just whats out there, but whats working well.

As we stated at the end of our first Prevailing In-App Ad Formats, we think this document could evolveto become a database for in-app ad formats organized by publisher, alongside the IABs existing

Creative Spec Database. We continue to welcome comments from marketers, agencies, publishers,device makers, vendors and others in the ecosystem on ways to deliver more utility from this survey.


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Appendix

iOS: iPad: screen resolution: 1024x768

Ad Format Prevalence File Weights Notes

1024x899 1 200KB 768x620 safe area "full page"

1024x768 1 welcome mat or interstitial

1024x90 expands to1024x768

1

1024x90 1

1024x66 expands to up to1024x768

1 precached, "up to"

1024x66 1 30KB

1004x768 1 150KB gallery interstitial

768x1024 1 welcome mat or interstitial


1

768x90 2 runs in 1024x90 space

728x90 7


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1PreVailing Mobile in-aPPlication adVertis ing ForMats

iOS: Phone: 320x480 or 640x960 ("retina display")


640x100 1 retina display only

480x320 1 video pre-roll ad, landscape only

320x480 2 welcome or interstitial

320x416 1

320x100 1 15KB

320x53 2 40KB


4 40KB expandable; rich mediaprecached


1 40KB


2 30KB

320x50 8


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1PreVailing Mobile in-aPPlication adVertis ing ForMats

Android-smartphones


500x500 1 30-45KB companion to audio; subject toresize

480x75 1 high res (droid); expandable tofull page

480x70 1320x480 1 interstitial

320x416 1

320x53 1 40KB

320x50 expandable to320x480

1 40KB


1 40KB


2 30KB

320x50 6


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1PreVailing Mobile in aPPlication adVertis ing ForMats

Blackberry


480x150 1 15KB spash/welcome screen


1 30KB

420x40 1 30KB

320x50 2 10KB; 8KB320x40 expands to320x240

1 30KB

320x40 1 30KB

300x250 1

mobile app formats final

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