Airbnb will out-drive Uber. Transportation services like Uber and Lyft pace the “sharing economy,” but lodging services like Airbnb have longer legs. Growth rates of ride-sharing companies will at 13.3% in 2017, according to a new study from eMarketer.The growth rate of virtual hotels will peak that same year at 15.5% but will taper off more slowly, maintaining a 7.5% growth rate in 2020, while Uber goes under that with 5%. At that point, both services will have about 20 million users, but lodging services will then begin to lead, the researcher forecasts.
eMarketer
American ad blockers to hit 102 million by 2020. Folks fed up with display ads intruding on their content and sucking up their data time will triple in the next five years, says a study from Optimal.com, a paid ad-blocker aggregator that shares revenue with publishers. That amounts to $39 billion in display spend blocked. Currently, 12% of U.S. users are blocking—not yet as severe as Europe, where 20% blocking rates are common. Optimal.com
Winners are the most engaging. Amobee tracked NBA talk across more than 600,000 mobile, web, and social sites last month and found the Golden State Warriors and the Cleveland Cavaliers—two of only four teams left in the playoffs—leading in mentions. The Los Angeles Lakers, helped by Kobe Bryant’s swan song, placed third. Interestingly, the first team to employ an old-school European marketing device by selling an ad on players’ jerseys finished last. The Philadelphia 76ers (and their StubHub patch), generated just 14% as much digital engagement as the Warriors.
Amobee/Adweek
