Digiday Research: Mobile commerce shows promise for publishers

The growing openness by consumers to make mobile purchases also shows promise for publishers who operate affiliate businesses. For publishers to earn affiliate revenue they typically need to be the last point of contact before a consumer makes a purchase. As consumers show a growing propensity to transact on mobile — instead of simply researching there and transacting later on desktop — that could lead to a boost in overall affiliate revenues. Earlier research of publishers that operate a commerce business found that the majority of their commerce revenue came from affiliate fees rather than sales of branded products.

Commerce revenue is a growing component in part of a larger publisher trend toward revenue diversification. Forty-three percent of publishers claim commerce revenues and several C-level publisher executives believe commerce presents the greatest business opportunity in 2018.

The potential for publishers to increase commerce revenues while boosting the share driven by mobile could be dependent on Amazon. Amazon dominates many publishers affiliate businesses and some publishers sell products directly on Amazon. The e-commerce giant also accounts for nearly half of all dollars spent online. If Amazon can continue to increase its mobile purchases then publishers revenue from mobile devices will almost certainly rise as a result.