2015 began on a high note for search marketers.
According to IgnitionOne’s “Q1 2015 Digital Marketing Report,” U.S. paid search spend experienced its highest YoY growth since 2012 this past quarter. The 26% surge also qualifies as the third highest percentage growth in a quarter in six years.
The culprit? Mobile devices—mainly smartphones, which showed an 81% YoY growth in spend. Programmatic display, however, also deserves some praise. A 36% increase in YoY spend was propelled as Facebook grew 46% YoY, despite a 90% drop in impressions due to changes in the number of ads shown to users.
Other findings include:
- Mobile display continues to expand. Impressions were up 85% and spend up 143%.
- Yahoo!/Bing grow market share for third consecutive quarter. Their network grew its U.S. search market share to 26.9% this past quarter—making it the highest its been since before the Search Alliance was founded. And at 73.1%, this is also the lowest network share Google has experienced since Q3 2008.
“While many have claimed Google is in decline, that is clearly not happening based on this data. Digital marketing continues to grow and Google is growing with it,” says Will Margiloff, CEO of IgnitionOne. “However, Google is not the juggernaut it used to be. It faces stiff and unyielding competition on all fronts of their vast multifaceted business in ways it hasn’t experienced for many years. It remains to be seen whether or not they can regain their previous momentum.”
