COLOGNE — Ever since Apple opened up the App Store, it is clear mobile phone consumption has all been about apps.
Could the rise of new mobile web technologies put the web back at the heart of consumers’ digital behavior that is now all about mobile?
Criteo’s Alexander Gösswein thinks what will be will be – but that all the current trend lines suggest advertisers who want to be in mobile should be in apps for some time to come.
“Will the app sustain in the future?,” says Criteo’s regional MD for DACH, MEA and Russia, in this video interview with Beet.TV. “Or will we have different ways of communicating with the users in the mobile environment?
“And our strong belief is you have now to invest in apps because the user is now there. No matter what is happening in five years, so even in five years there is no app anymore it doesn’t matter. Now there’s a user, you have to go for the app.”
Of course, Criteo wants to be in mobile, too. In fact, it’s working the nexus of mobile, advertising and ecommerce.
Back in Q4 2017, its Global Commerce Report found booming in-app retail sales, with Latin America seeing a 37% year-on-year bump in mobile commerce transactions.
But the extent to which everything is mobile is one thing on which emerging markets have the upper hand, Gösswein says.
“What we see now mainly in the Asian region and in East Africa is that the world becomes an app only world,” he adds.
“So all the business goes to app, and this is not yet the case for Europe. So Europe is lacking a bit behind there.
This interview is part of a series titled Advertising Reimagined: The View from DMEXCO 2018, presented by Criteo. Please find more videos from the series here.
