Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, has suggested that ad-blocking is not yet a threat to publishers' advertising models. Sir Martin reasoned that 90% of smartphone users on the dominant iOS or Android operating systems spend the majority of their time within apps, which are outside the ad-blocking danger zone. Although in-app ad-blockers are currently limited, as seen with the removal of Been Choice from the App Store, it does not prevent the possibility of more in future. The report also suggests that publishers should consider using ad blockers, but only if they can prove that they have done so responsibly and legally.
Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP, has suggested that ad-blocking is not yet a threat to publishers' advertising models. Sir Martin reasoned that 90% of smartphone users on the dominant iOS or Android operating systems spend the majority of their time within apps, which are outside the ad-blocking danger zone. Although in-app ad-blockers are currently limited, as seen with the removal of Been Choice from the App Store, it does not prevent the possibility of more in future. Nevertheless, the WPP boss's observation that most of the revenue being lost to ad-blocking is from desktops rather than mobile was validated by a report from Adobe and PageFair, which indicated that over 98% of ad-blocking happens on PCs compared to 1.6% on mobile devices.