4 Minutes With Mark Slade: Dispelling Myths About Mobile Gaming

It’s Mark Slade’s mission to bust myths about the mobile gaming industry. Mark, who brings his 15+ years of advertising experience to his position at Digital Turbine as the VP of Brand Marketing and Managing Director of Brand Partnerships (UK, DE, FR), believes mobile gaming is a premium advertising environment well-worth space in the budget. Now recent research proves he’s on the money. In the first episode of this year’s “4 Minutes With…” series, MMA Chief Content Officer Peggy Anne Salz chats with Mark about the reality of mobile gaming in Germany. Mark also discussed why advertising to players is a solid strategy that reaches an engaged audience primed to interact with advertising and reveals the metrics that matter most.

Watch Mark’s full interview below.

The Truth About Mobile Gaming

Mobile gaming is a booming industry that isn’t slowing down soon. Global mobile gaming revenue grew from $118.34 billion in 2022 to $138.63 billion in 2023 at a compound annual growth rate of 17.1%. By 2027, the mobile gaming market is forecast to reach $267.46 billion. Ad revenue alone was projected to reach $11.2 billion in 2022.

Despite the explosion in mobile gaming and the race among major brands such as Gucci and McDonald’s to establish a presence in gaming apps and across the metaverse, some marketers are still wary about placing their ads in mobile games. They believe ads will only be shown to a young audience, fail to deliver ROI, and distract from gameplay. These assumptions could not be further from the truth.

Leading independent mobile growth and advertising platform Digital Turbine partnered with the MMA to research player behavior and attitude toward advertising. The snapshot study of mobile gaming in Germany busts many myths about gamer demographics and preferences.

Key findings:

• German adults love mobile games. They make up 52% of the country’s players.
• Users aged 30–49 account for 42% of German mobile gamers.
• 59% of study respondents prefer to watch video ads in exchange for in-game benefits rather than pay for those perks.

Lastly, the research provides hard data that underlines the primary position of video ads in the marketing mix. Specifically, 42% of study respondents remember video ads better on their smartphones. This is significantly higher than ad recall on TV (28%) and proves mobile ads are a better environment for recall and attention than traditional advertising avenues. “It’s an untapped area for advertisers,” Mark explains. “Moreover, the amount of spend for major brands and advertisers isn’t commensurate with the time spent. So there’s a big opportunity here for advertisers.”

The Important Mobile Ad Metrics

Attention metrics are crucial to understanding ad performance. Mainly measured by in-view time, exposure rate, hover rate, and touch rate, attention metrics tell marketers how engaged customers are when viewing an ad.

Mark reports Digital Turbine is seeing incredible growth in its in-view time metrics, capturing users’ attention for an average of 22 seconds. In a study with Lumen Marketing, Digital Turbine found that in spontaneous recalls, over half of the participants remembered brands in the ads. The link between attention and ad recall is also measurable. Most games are equipped with SDK integration, allowing advertisers to track conversions.