Google today announced that AdWords advertisers will be able to run campaigns in the AdMob network of more than 300,000 mobile apps — a move that could turn out to be lucrative for both mobile app publishers and Google.
In a blog post announcing the integration (Google sent me an early copy), the company says that AdMob campaigns will be added to the regular AdWords dashboard. When the advertiser is choosing the type of campaign that they want to run, they can just select the “Display Network only (mobile apps)” option, and then they’re creating an AdMob campaign. In AdWords, they can also target their ads at specific smartphone or tablet models, and direct their campaign at specific app categories. They can even target specific apps.
Google acquired AdMob for $750 million two years ago, and the company describes this as “the latest chapter in our ongoing efforts not only to bring AdMob’s and Google’s tools together, but to mobilize all of our ads products and services.” Last November, for example, Google opened the doors for AdMob developers to make their ad inventory available on the DoubleClick ad exchange.
Since we’re talking about Google, this kind of integration could have big implications. The company brought search advertising to an enormous scale thanks in large part to AdWords’ simple, self-serve model. Google executives said earlier this year that they want to achieve similar scale in video by integrating video ads into AdWords, and now it looks like they’re trying to do something similar in mobile. (Specifically in mobile apps — even before this you could buy mobile search ads in AdWords.)
After all, Google says AdWords has 1 million advertisers, and I wouldn’t be surprised if many of them are still in the early (or pre-early) stages of thinking about their mobile strategy and are only vaguely aware of AdMob (note how the campaign selection process described above downplays the AdMob connection). This makes mobile advertising more accessible to them, and also makes it easier to manage a campaign across multiple platforms from the AdWords dashboard.
Google provides search and advertising services, which together aim to organize and monetize the world’s information. In addition to its dominant search engine, it offers a plethora of online tools and platforms including: Gmail, Maps, YouTube, and Google+, the company’s extension into the social space. Most of its Web-based products are free, funded by Google’s highly integrated online advertising platforms AdWords and AdSense. Google promotes the idea that advertising should be highly targeted and relevant to users thus providing...
AdMob is a mobile advertising marketplace that connects advertisers with mobile publishers. They allow advertisers to create and target ads with plenty of detail. Ads can be targeted to locations, carriers, phone platforms and phone manufacturers. Ads can also be targeted to specific sites or you can browse their channel categories including categories like communities, contextual search, entertainment, etc. All ads are run on an auction-based pricing system. AdMob clients include ESPN, CBS, Geico and Starbucks. AdMob was acquired...
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