Emarketer Sees 2014 Mobile Ad Spending at $31.5B

Worldwide spending on mobile advertising is expected to reach $31.5 billion this year, a 75 percent increase from 2013, thanks largely to Facebook and Google, according to a new report by research firm eMarketer.

By the end of this year, eMarketer expects mobile to account for nearly a quarter of total digital-ad spending, which is estimated to reach $137.5 billion. That’s up from 15 percent of the total of $119.8 billion of digital-ad spending in 2013.

Mobile-ad spending has been growing fast in the last couple of years, mainly due to ad-revenue growth at Facebook Inc., the world’s largest social network, and internet search giant Google Inc.

In 2013, spending on mobile advertisements more than doubled, to nearly $18 billion from $8.8 billion in 2012. Facebook and Google accounted for most of that increase. Together, their mobile-ad revenue rose $6.9 billion.

EMarketer expects Facebook’s share of the mobile-ad market to grow to 21.7 percent this year from 17.5 percent in 2013, taking a bite out of Google’s share. Google remains No. 1, with half of the mobile advertising market in 2013. This year, that’s expected to decline to 46.8 percent.