Mobile paid search will make up 25.4% of all clicks (desktop + mobile) in December 2011, according to November analysis from Performics, which revised its projections up 8% points from a month ago due to a significant increase in paid search spend across its clients leading up to the holidays, with an over-indexed investment in mobile. Data from the analysis indicates that mobile was 12.7% of all Google impressions (desktop + mobile) and 15.3% of all clicks (excluding content and search partners) in October, while in December, mobile is expected to represent 20.1% of all impressions.
Meanwhile, according to [pdf] IgnitionOne, paid search clicks on mobile in the first half of Q4 jumped 355.2% compared to the same time last year, with mobile ad spend on Google alone up 288% year-over-year.
Tablet CPCs Rising
Although smartphone CPCs remain about 40% less than desktop CPCs, tablet CPCs have been catching up to desktop CPCs over the past 2 months, according to the analysis. In fact, possibly due to heavy holiday paid search competition, tablet CPCs peaked at 20% higher than desktop than desktop CPCs at the beginning of the week leading up to Thanksgiving, after starting September at 80% of desktop CPCs.
Overall Search Ad Spend Grows
According to IgnitionOne (see link above), US search spend from existing retail marketers across all search major search engines is up 31.2% year-over-year for the first half of Q4. This rate of growth is slightly down compared to 2010’s growth over 2009 (36.7%) but still shows strong total growth in spending. Data from the report indicates that the number of transactions has increased 120%, along with a 52% increase in revenue ahead of the peak holiday shopping season. Revenue per click has held steady with a small increase of 5.5%.
More information about paid search is available at MarketingVox.
Conversion Rates Also Rise
Search ads are shown to be performing better this year, with a 52.3% increase compared to the first half of Q4 in 2010. Last year’s year-over-year growth was 28.7%, while in 2009, year-over-year growth was more muted at 17%.
About the Data: The IgnitionOne report tracked more than 5 billion impressions and 75 million clicks on Google and Yahoo!/Bing search networks, Google AdEx, and other display networks from Oct 1, 2010 to Nov 13, 2011 across IgnitionOne’s retail clients.
