The US accounts for nearly a quarter of all display ad impressions in the world, followed by China and Japan, according to new data revealed by Google.
The research, from Google’s display ad properties, including DoubleClick for publishers, the DoubleClick ad exchange and the Google adsense network.
Google controls nearly half of the global online advertising market so the data offers a valuable insight into global display ad trends.
The findings were based on data sets containing tens of billions of impressions served by publishers around the world.
The study looked at the top performing formats, website categories and seasonal trends in terms of display ad impressions and CPM.
The report, entitled “Display Business Trends: Publisher Edition” aims to answer a few of of the most common questions that Google hears from clients, and put some data behind long-held industry assumptions.
Key findings from the report are published below:
• Is the banner really dead? If you mean the 468×60 banner, then it might be time to hold a wake. This ad size dropped down to 3% of all impressions. Brand-friendly “premium” units are gaining share and we’re seeing that smaller ad units are dropping in popularity. However nearly 80% of all impressions are the ad unit “three musketeers”: the medium rectangle, leaderboard, and skyscraper still comprise the vast majority of ads served.
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• What types of sites are showing strong impression growth? In 2011, we found that Shopping, Sports, and Auto & Vehicle sites were some of the fastest year-on-year growth verticals on the Ad Exchange and AdSense. We saw impressive figures across the board, with 15 out of 25 publisher verticals displaying double-digit growth.
• Are your sell-through rates getting a 17% holiday bonus? Anecdotally we’ve heard that publishers’ sell-through rates increase at the end of the year, thanks to higher advertiser holiday spending. We’re now able to quantify this end-of-year shift, and we found that the global publisher sell-through rate increases from 36% to 42% in the fourth quarter. Comparing the regions in 2011, European publishers experienced the greatest sell-through boost, increasing to 47%.
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• How fast is the growth in mobile and video? Growth in mobile usage has exploded, with mobile web impressions on the Ad Exchange and AdSense platforms increasing by 250% from the third to fourth quarter in 2011. Over the same period, video ad impressions increased nearly 70% across the DFP Video platform.
• Where in the world are you? All over, as it turns out. Of a possible estimated 245 different countries and territories, we saw publisher ad impressions from 235 of them. These included the island country of Palau – one of the world’s newest sovereign states – and the middle-African nation of Equatorial Guinea, with astounding growth rates of 1106% and 4635% respectively. And while the United States still accounts for the highest percentage of impressions overall, we’re seeing a significant representation from China and Japan, coming in at 11% and 6% respectively.
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To read the report in full, click here (PDF)
