IAB: Paid Search 62 Percent Of Global Mobile Advertising Revenue In 2011

The IAB released global mobile ad revenue estimates for 2011, building on its earlier release of US mobile ad revenue data. The IAB says that total mobile ad revenues, on a global basis, were $5.3 billion last year. (See our related Marketing Land coverage.)

One of the most striking things about the report is how much paid-search dominates all other ad categories — even more than on the PC. According to the IAB mobile paid search revenue was just under $3.3 billion in 2011. In North America (mostly US) it was a little over $800 million.

If these numbers are accurate we know a great deal more about Google’s mobile ad revenues. That’s because Google probably represents more than 90 percent of mobile paid search advertising. It may control more than 95 percent in fact — commensurate with Google’s dominant market share.

Google also controls a substantial portion of mobile display advertising too.

In the US paid search revenue is 46 percent of total advertising revenue on the PC. Mobile paid search revenues are 48 percent of the total according to the IAB data above. That’s pretty interesting.

There was previously an eMarketer forecast that projected paid search would grow to dominate mobile advertising by 2014 or 2015. It appears that the opposite is true: paid search is already dominant; now it’s up to the other formats to catch up.