Facebook’s marketing partner Kenshoo revealed some interesting data in a new digital marketing study. Mobile spends showed a huge increase in the 2^nd quarter of 2015 over last year, social media ad spend outpaced search advertising while spends on search advertising increased meagrely.

Latest trends revealed by Kenshoo’s digital marketing study

Key findings of the digital marketing study:

(Quarter on Quarter = QoQ, Year on Year = YoY)

• Mobile (phone and tablet) YoY spending increased 167% for paid social ads and 37% for paid search; mobile comprised 63% of paid social spend (up from 51% last year) and 38% of paid search spend (up from 31%)

• Social impressions remained stable QoQ and decreased 64% YoY whereas paid search impressions increased 14% QoQ and 12% YoY
• Social clicks increased 45% QoQ and 129% YoY while Paid search clicks increased 9% QoQ and 17% YoY

• Cost-per-click (CPC) for social and search declined QoQ (-12% and -4% respectively) and YoY (-7% and -5% respectively), showing greater efficiencies across channels and devices
• Social click-through rate increased 44% QoQ and 535% YoY but Paid search click-through rate decreased 4% QoQ but increased 4% YoY

The study was extended across to the Americas; Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA); and Asia Pacific Japan (APJ) regions. The key findings were:

• In APJ, smartphone spend and clicks increased 69% and 68% YoY respectively
• In the Americas, smartphone spend and clicks increased 77% and 79% YoY respectively
• In EMEA, smartphone spend and clicks increased 46% and 52% YoY respectively

“For many years running we’ve heard ‘this is the year of mobile,’ and reality has caught up to the hype,” said Chris Costello, director of marketing research for Kenshoo. “Advanced marketers have truly begun to understand how to achieve efficiencies across devices and channels to generate increased revenue and ROI. Continued growth in spend and decreasing costs show marketers and consumers alike finding value in highly relevant ads, no matter their preferred channel or device.”

Did you know that Asian Mums are big consumers of mobile phone content? Read our Asian Digital Mums Survey 2015 for more insights on how you can target this high-potential attractive market segment.

Digital marketing study for Asian Mums

Implications for the Savvy Digital Marketer

• If you are not already spending your buck in the right place – mobiles, now is the time to get there. Also, mobile media usage and mobile media spending are still not on the same level. So there is plenty of opportunity!
• Social ads are driving clicks; think, innovate, brainstorm engagement-based campaigns to stay on top. Get inspired by some of the best FB campaigns of 2014!

Kenshoo arrived at the conclusions by analysing 550 billion ad impressions on leading digital media properties such as search engines Google and Baidu, as well as on social platforms such as Facebook and Twitter.