United States brands are significantly increasing their spend on mobile advertising, putting the market on track to become the largest mobile ad spend market for the first time this year, according to a new report from eMarketer.

Until this year, Japan was the world?s largest market for mobile advertising, with spending on mobile Internet ads in Japan forecast to grow 27.2 percent to $1.74 billion in 2012, versus 35.4 percent growth in 2011. However, mobile advertising spending in the United States is expected to grow 96.6 percent this year for a total of $2.29 billion.

?Japan has always been a relatively advanced market in terms of mobile advertising,? said Clark Fredricksen, vice president of communications for eMarketer, New York. ?What is surprising is how fast the growth is in the U.S.

?In 2008, mobile Internet advertising in the U.S. was just over $100 million and by 2010 it reached $500 million,? he said. ?Since then it has doubled every year - it is growing incredibly fast.

?Whereas Japan has gone up incrementally from $1.01 billion in 2010 to $1.37 billion in 2011 and this year will reach $1.74 billion.

Growing opportunities for advertisers
The significant growth in the U.S. market is helping to drive mobile ad spending worldwide, with eMarketer forecasting worldwide mobile advertising spending to total $6.43 billion this year.

There are several factors contributing to the acceleration in the U.S. mobile ad market, including the growing penetration of smartphones.

?The big underlying factor is that smartphone and Internet mobile usage are growing very quickly,? Mr. Fredricksen said. ?This is opening up a lot of opportunities for advertisers.

?You also have a high concentration of big spending advertisers here, many of whom are already jumping into digital with big budgets so the switch to mobile is a natural progression,? he said.

?The consolidation that is going on ? Google bought AdMob, Apple bought Quattro - is contributing to them pushing the market forward very quickly.?

A small slice
The reason for the slower growth in Japan compared with the U.S. is that the Japanese market is more mature.

However, the Asia-Pacific region is still very strong in mobile advertising, particularly in South Korea and Japan, placing it ahead of regions. 

Mobile ad spending in Asia-Pacific will pass $2.56 billion in 2012, according to eMarketer, while mobile advertising spending in Western Europe and Eastern Europe will reach $1.3 billion and $121.1 million, respectively, this year.

Other markets such as Britain and China are also growing very quickly, per eMarketer.
While mobile ad spending is undergoing significant growth, the channel still represents a very small piece of the overall ad spending pie.

Mobile advertising accounted for less than one percent of total ad spend worldwide last year.

?There are a lot of experimentation dollars going toward mobile,? Mr. Fredricksen said. ?People are scaling their mobile ad businesses very quickly but it is still a very small piece of the pie and it will be a long time before mobile truly competes with bigger, more traditional advertising channels."

Final Take
Chantal Tode is associate editor on Mobile Marketer, New York