Hector Almeida, GM, EMEA at Mintegral explains why the open internet deserves a bigger share of your advertising budget.
There’s a saying in advertising that the money follows the eyeballs. Build an audience, and the advertising dollars will flow.
That’s largely true, but there is a huge discrepancy:
According to The Trade Desk, although U.S. consumers spend 59% of their online time on the open internet, only 48% of advertisers’ money is spent there. The majority of ad spend—52%–goes to walled gardens like Meta, Google, TikTok and others, even as user numbers on these platforms fall.
The Industry Giants Aren’t What They Used To Be
eMarketer reported in 2023 that walled gardens lost share in the programmatic ad spend market for the first time since it started tracking the space in 2017, predicting that the decline would continue in 2023.
There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, the cost of advertising on walled gardens is rising. B2B media platform Business of Apps found that in 2024, the minimum Facebook Ads’ cost per install would stay at $2, but the maximum jumped up to $5.50. By contrast, many open-web-based ad networks (including Mintegral) can achieve installs below $1. That difference is massive at scale, making it no surprise that app publishers are looking for alternative user acquisition channels.
Apple’s introduction of its App Tracking Transparency framework (ATT) also hit the walled gardens’ ad model. ATT effectively limited third-party tracking on iOS devices, making it harder and more costly to find target audiences.
Over time, brands adapted by improving their measurement stack. Given that walled gardens handle measurement internally, discrepancies appeared, and brands moved their campaigns to places where they could measure more accurately.
Finally, every channel naturally becomes less effective over time. As the channel loses its novelty, marketers look for their next area of growth.
Enter: The Open Internet
The open web is made up of millions of independent apps, ad networks, mediation platforms, supply partners and demand partners, making it the natural next destination for advertisers.
Any independent app is part of the open internet, and there are multiple ways to buy advertising there. Marketers can reach audiences across a massive range of digital environments because there are so many different inventory sources. Users in App A could be totally different from App B, whereas users across walled gardens might be virtually identical. This diversity gives marketers who harness the open internet a massive advantage over those who do not.
At first glance, the open web’s fragmented ecosystem makes it look like a more challenging place to find and engage valuable users compared to walled gardens, where everyone is collected in one place. But developments in machine learning have leveled the playing field by offering powerful solutions.
Today, advertisers can analyze all available data in real time, making accurate, automated decisions on targeting, bidding, and engagement, then purchasing ads across the open web in milliseconds.
Furthermore, on the open web, advertisers can choose how campaigns are optimized—whether on a cost per install (CPI), per event (CPE), or return on ad spend (ROAS) basis. The open internet also provides extensive reach, offers ROI-driven products and supports diverse ad formats that go beyond what a walled garden offers.Many brands are already experimenting on the open web and reaping the rewards. Gaming companies are targeting gamers in other gaming inventory with playable ads that enable users to try the game before they commit to downloading it.
Meanwhile, e-commerce and other non-gaming advertisers are gaining access to expanded and segmented audience targeting, using data-driven algorithms to reach broad yet highly relevant demographics, performance-based pricing flexibility, and advanced creative formats, such as shoppable videos and augmented reality experiences that are proven to drive conversions.
Three Considerations for Shifting to the Open Web
If the open internet sounds appealing, here are three things you should know:
- The open web is a vast, decentralized ecosystem of independent apps, exchanges, and multiple advertising platforms. You have to get to grips with many different interfaces and understand the nuances of each platform.
- Many app publishers want scale.When looking for a marketing partner that bids on the open web, you want to ensure your fill rate requirements are matched, and that you can spend at high volumes while getting the results you want.
- Because programmatic buying works across multiple platforms, marketers have to work with mobile measurement platforms (MMPs) to centralize their data. MMPs provide a rounded understanding of the effectiveness of campaigns, but each operates differently.The layer between the ad platform and the user adds a degree of complexity that takes some getting used to.
The good news is that there are experienced partners out there who can open the door to this whole new world of quality inventory. The brands that lean into the open internet now are the ones most likely to find the next wave of digital growth.