Smartwatches may have only caught on with a small portion of consumers to date but advertisers are already looking at opportunities to bring their ads to wearables. According to Juniper Research, advertising on smartwatches will be worth US$68.6 million by 2019. In comparison, such advertising is expected to only reach about US$1.5 million this year. US$70 million is less than a drop in the bucket of overall global advertising but it’s clear that advertisers are leaving no stone unturned either.
Delivering ads on a smartwatch is not without its challenges. Displays on wearables are tiny and they are not expected to get much larger as there is only so much room on our wrists. New design formats will need to not only overcome the challenge of limited screen real estate but also the fact that interactions with a smartwatch are typically limited to short glances rather than minutes at a time on a smartphone or other media.
Will advertisers be able to come up with ads that catch a user’s attention without frustrating them when they’re looking for a quick bit of information on their smartwatch? Advertisers have proven quite creative in the past about delivering ads and are unlikely to let a small display stop them from bringing their ads to our smartwatches.
The Digital Advertising: Online, Mobile & Wearables 2015-2019 report is available online for purchase through Juniper’s website.
Source : Juniper Research