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Of all the mobile ad networks, AdMob has the largest number of ads and advertisers, many of them small or medium-sized companies. But certainly not all: AdMob’s top tier ad partners include Coca-Cola, Adidas, Ebay, Motorola, Nokia, and Atlantic Records. AdMob also claims to have the largest number of publishers - about 1,800 of them.

When asked what has made AdMob so successful, Jason Spero, AdMob’s VP of Marketing, answers, “From its beginning, AdMob has worked to make it easy for advertisers and publishers to leverage mobile ads… Mobile is a terrifically complex medium, with different handsets, different carriers, and different languages… AdMob tapped into huge pent-up demand.” Developers of mobile sites wanted to monetize their traffic but in many cases did not have the resources or relationships to make an advertising deal directly with a carrier.

AdMob uses a simple, self-serve approach. Publishers are given code which they install in their PHP, JSP, ASP, or CGI driven mobile web pages. Ad-serving algorithms evaluate ad performance, says Spero, which “means that the most valuable ad will be identified and served for a particular user and a particular mobile web site.” AdMob’s fill rates are above 95% in the US and above 80% worldwide. Perhaps significantly, competitor Third Screen Media’s MADX ad management platform offers a version for publishers and a version for advertising agencies, but doesn’t advertise a version for ordinary advertisers.

AdMob can deal with variations in handsets and platforms, unlike other mobile content providers, because they have built proprietary technology that maps device capabilities. When AdMob receives a call for an advertisement, it can target ads based on the capabilities of the specific handset that will view the ad. Some of these capabilities include screen size, memory, operating system, and the ability to stream video or to play downloaded video.

For example, in AdMob’s recent Coca-Cola campaign, Coke wanted to drive users to a page where they could view videos from Coke’s bottle films. So AdMob served Coke’s ads only to users whose devices could handle videos. Maybe that’s one of the reasons why Coke saw great click-through rates, the average user played the video more than once, and “Coke was extremely satisfied with the campaign,” says Spero.

We carefully asked Spero, “What further consolidation do you foresee in the mobile advertising world?”, knowing that AdMob is the largest mobile advertising power that hasn’t (yet) been acquired by another company. We analyzed recent consolidations when we reported on the purchases of Aquantive, ScreenTonic, and Third Screen Media. But Spero didn’t rise to the bait. He simply agreed that “there has been some consolidation among the mobile advertising companies… AdMob sees huge opportunity, and plans to make investments to grow the business in different country markets.”

- Michael M