Equativ, the leading independent ad tech platform, is growing its gaming advertising services. Offering access to quality inventory across premium apps, the company will soon release refined category targeting options and auction packages, alongside a greater range of formats.

This expansion of capabilities will better-equip advertisers and publishers to harness the continuing growth of the gaming sector. Generating $396.20 billion in global revenue, overall market value is due to reach $533 billion by 2027, climbing at a 7% annual compound growth rate (CAGR). Mobile gaming is experiencing especially rapid gains; seeing an increase of 17% CAGR over the last year, with revenues rising from $118.43 billion to $138.63 billion.

The thriving sector is also proving a particularly effective environment for driving advertising engagement. Following an extensive two-year study by in-game advertising platform Anzu and attention tech company Lumen Research, it was revealed that intrinsic in-game ads achieve up to 97% prompted recall and viewing times of 3.1 seconds – compared to the 2.9 second digital ad norm. This is in addition to fuelling high purchase intent for six in ten gamers. Gadsme, “the most sophisticated in-game advertising platform”, a company based in Paris and London, is able to measure clicks and has observed rates of 0.4% to 6% depending on the game and the quality of the creative. This click rate, much higher than the average rate of 0.5% observed in a “classic” environment, is thought to be linked to a friendly and safe perception of the gaming ecosystem on the part of players.

Equativ’s existing solutions enable gaming app publishers to create custom auction packages covering display, standard digital video and highly interactive rewarded video formats. Using its efficient curation abilities, sell-side partners — such Anzu, AdInMo and Gadsme — can securely activate first-party player data and build valuable, bespoke audiences, in addition to making ad space directly available to media buyers manually via integrated technology.

With availability spanning more than 41,000 apps, the platform also provides significant scale for advertisers. Buy-side partners can reach qualified mobile gamers across multiple popular apps — including Candy Crush Saga, Wordscapes and Woodoku — while further enriching audiences and ad space by harnessing smart curation features to onboard owned insights.

Over 2023, Equativ plans to enhance its range of formats by adding curation support for engaging and immersive in-game ads. This will be followed by further developments aimed at improving the precision of ad delivery: including allowing targeting for specific gaming app categories and creating a broader selection of pre-configured auction packages, segmented by player and game type.

“Despite gaming’s powerful grip on mainstream consumer attention, its share of advertising spend has been unrealized by the buy-side. By facilitating simplified, secure, and customizable trading, we aim to change that,” said Emir Teffaha, Senior Vice President, Agency and Enterprise, at Equativ.

“As leading industry forces, like the IAB, help to push standards and measurement around gaming for both performance and branding campaigns, wider industry adoption will inevitably gain traction. This means those who get ahead of the curve stand to reap the greatest benefits. By providing privacy-safe mechanisms for building data-enriched deals, our offering will enable granular targeting and efficient monetization that allows all players to start driving mutually rewarding and high-value outcomes.”