Ad Block Apps: RIP Digital Ad Revenues?
“The rise of ad blocking is a symptom of a real problem: Ads suck. To slow the adoption of ad blocking and make the Internet a better place, we need to make advertising better.”1
- James Avery, CEO, Adzerk
There has been an ongoing debate, since September 2015, among the Indian digital advertising industry experts, over the ad blocking applications, triggered after the announcement of the launch of iOS9 by Apple Inc. (Apple), the California, US-based consumer electronics company. On June 8th 2015, Apple announced the launch of its new operating system iOS9 (codenamed ‘Monarch’), at WWDC 2015 (World Wide Developers Conference, 2015). The new operating system iOS9 allowed users to download applications from Apple store that would block ads on their mobile devices.
While the users were relieved, players in the digital media industry were concerned about the losses that the industry would likely incur because of the ad blocking apps. On the other hand, advertisers or website developers had integrated applications – ad block blockers – that would nullify the effect of ad blockers and enable the display of ads on the users’ phones and browsers. While many companies and industry experts were concerned about the repercussions of the ad blocks, few perceived it as an opportunity for advertisers and agencies to create great content that could get past the blockade. Are ad blocks innovators (enabling better customer experience) or intruders (into companies, especially advertising companies’ coffers)? Does the Indian advertising industry need to worry about the ad block apps or would it get past them?...........................
Exhibits
Exhibit I: Mobile Phone and Smartphone Users in India (2014-2019)
Exhibit II: Usage of Internet in India
Exhibit III: Online Ads and Internet Users
Exhibit IV: Rise of Digital Consumer in India
Exhibit V: Indian Media and Entertainment Industry and Advertising Revenues – Size and Projections
Exhibit VI: Digital Ad Spends – Growth in 2016
Exhibit VII: Social Media Usage for Advertising in India, Purpose, Spends and Challenges
Exhibit VIII (a): The Digital Advertising Ecosystem
Exhibit VIII (b): The Digital Advertising Ecosystem - The Players
Exhibit VIII (c): The Digital Advertising Ecosystem – Value Chain
Exhibit IX: Ad Blocker Threat to Global Digital Advertising Revenue
1 James Avery, “Ad Blocking Will Keep Growing Until We Make Ads Better”, http://adexchanger.com/data-driven-thinking/adblocking-will-keep-growing-until-we-make-ads-better-2/, September 11th 2015 (accessed date: February 26th 2016)