According to the to Interactive Advertising Bureau, total online ad revenue reached $9.26 billion in the third quarter of 2012, which is up six percent from the previous quarter and 18 percent from Q3 figure of $7.8 billion a year ago.

The CEO of IAB, Randall Rothenberg, said the growth is due to marketers recognizing digital media’s capacity for engagement and interaction. He cited social media and mobile on-the-go marketing as examples.

Here’s the IAB’s chart of online ad growth in recent years:

The upshot for publishers is that, while the mobile monetization riddle has not been solved, the growing amount of dollars flowing into the digital space is likely to produce solutions soon.

IAB compiles the numbers based on a revenue survey of web sites, commercial online services, free email providers and all other companies selling online advertising.

According to a report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau, mobile ad buyers in Europe and Asia are spending almost three times more on search: a combined $2,284 million versus $858 million. In North America, the discrepancy is smaller but still tilted heavily in favor of search over display: $811 million versus $572 million. Ads related to mobile messaging make up a much smaller category.

The new figures could further muddy companies’ efforts to solve the mobile ad problem that helped sandbag Facebook’s big IPO last month. Even though ad pundits have predicted that 2012 (and before that 2011) is the year mobile advertising takes off, the heralded boom has yet to arrive.

The problems include smaller screens that are less friendly to display ads and a sense that mobile ads are inherently intrusive. Still, the advertising industry remains tantalized by the promise of a mobile ad breakthrough that will let it deliver personalized messages to consumers wherever they go.

Research firm eMarketer predicts U.S. mobile advertising will grow five fold to $10 billion by 2016 and the spending split between search and display will be about equal.

In the meantime, Facebook is redoubling its mobile ad strategy by offering marketers a chance to buy “sponsored stories” within users’ mobile feeds. At the same time, Forbes reports that Google is attempting to consolidate various pieces of the fragmented industry so as to give advertisers a chance to serve and track the same ad across a variety of platforms.

(Clarification - A Facebook spokesperson provided the following statement: ”Marketers were able to buy sponsored stories on mobile as part of a bundle since fMC earlier this year. [The] announcement just makes it possible for them to buy sponsored stories on mobile separately from other placements.”)

Here’s a shot of the ad breakdown from today’s report:

It’s easy to feel jaded by the issuance of yet another set of industry principles. But while things won’t change tomorrow or next week or even next month, this latest step could eventually be more meaningful over the next six months. In essence, the principles are not pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking, but reflect wider steps taken by all parts of the industry.

There is more general agreement now than in recent years about the value of what a basic set of measurements should look like. Plus, measurement companies, like Nielsen, comScore (NSDQ: SCOR), Kantar and others have been moving closer toward capturing a seamless set of online and offline audience ratings and data points.

Furthermore, within the past two years, display formats have evolved from the kind of “click here now” direct response formats to more engaging and creative interactive ads. The IAB has also streamlined the number of ad forms for display and has given its imprimatur to several “rising star” formats, which will provide the kind of uniformity that a 30-second spot or a back-page magazine cover provides. In the past, online sites were made up of a farrago of ad units, forcing agencies and marketers to recreate the same ad for each site — a costly and time consuming process. Now that that problem has largely been addressed, developing principles behind the measuring these basic ad units should be easier.

The principles themselves are pretty broad and are anodyne in nature (who’s going to make a serious argument against counting “viewable impressions?”). But online advertising remains much more complex than traditional media, given that the systems in place at marketers, agencies and publishers are still geared toward traditional models of buying and selling media. So consider these principles a clear step in the right direction and reflection of the evolution currently taking place.

The IAB worked with the 4A’s, which represents ad agencies, and the Association of National Advertisers, on the project, but the actual principles were crafted by Bain & Company and media consultants MediaLink.

Here they are:

Principle #1 – Move to a “viewable impressions” standard.

What does it matter if an ad is “served” to a site if it isn’t viewed? Unlike TV, the web has the ability to measure whether an ad was viewed, and sites should offer that as part of a set of measurement standards for the industry.

Principle #2 – Online advertising must switch to a currency based on audience impressions, not gross ad impressions.

At a time when marketers are buying “audiences” instead of titles, the current digital currency makes it extremely difficult to gauge success. The idea here is that if marketers were better able to understand how many people in their target audience are being reached by a campaign — and how frequently they are being reached — they’d be more apt to spend more online.

Principle #3 – Because all ad units are not created equal, the industry must create a better classification system.

TV has the 30-second spot and magazines have the full-page back cover. But digital has myriad ad units. A better classification system would create a set of accepted units and describe them in plain English. While some ads do have better descriptives attached to them– like “pulldowns” or “pushdowns” — others are still referred to as 300 x 250 or 300 x 600, which isn’t as much help to marketers who are dealing with the compexity of creating and measuring ad units across websites.

Principle #4 – Determine interactivity metrics “that matter” for brand marketers, so that marketers can better evaluate online’s contribution to brand building.

Currently, the industry is awash in digital interaction metrics. However, these metrics are not necessarily relevant for brand marketers. Aside from click-throughs, there are few standards for enabling reliable comparison across sites.

Principle #5 – Digital media measurement must become increasingly comparable and integrated with other media.

Marketers are increasingly calling for ad agencies to tear down the barriers between traditional formats like TV and print and digital. They want to be able to go to one place to make buys across all those platforms — and then see how those campaigns are performing against each other. So it makes sense that how a campaign performs in its online vs linear forms has to become easier to evaluate.

During a panel moderated by paidContent’s David Kaplan, representatives of the Internet Advertising Bureau, mobile app network Zumobi, and Tapad, a technology developer for those looking to target multiple devices, asserted that the mobile ad opportunity is there for many of their clients and partners. However, a few things need to fall into place before the mobile ad market, at around $1 billion in yearly revenue, draws closer to the $26 billion a year spent on online advertising in general.

Anna Bager, IAB: Most of the work done by the IAB on mobile has been around developing the same set of standard ad units that it has developed for the broader online world. Mobile makes it tricky to get right, she said, but the IAB has just released guidelines for how mobile ads should be implemented to allow advertisers to target multiple devices with their ads, instead of having to rebuild an ad unit for each new device or browser. Coming soon: guidelines for in-app advertising.

Brenda Walker, Zumobi: Mobile advertising has the potential to be among the most engaging of ad technologies but technology hurdles can prevent brands from attaining the full realm of possibilities. One key is finding the right technology talent to build your ad content for yourself or your clients, Walker said, as well as making sure you are honest and up front about the type of data your ad collects and stores. “Consumers expect choice. If we provide them with that, it’s sometimes surprising what they will choose to give us.”

Are Traasdahl, Tapad: Targeted ads are more lucrative for publishers and beneficial to advertisers, and mobile allows ads to be extremely targeted , especially when you consider localized ads that ensure you can reach the exact audience you seek. Tapad has built technology that it claims allows its partners to target consumers across a range of devices and usage models, but it has to be a two-way street: “It really needs to start with the consumer on the mobile device. To have a positive value exchange with the consumer, have to get something positive back from the user.” And the best way to do that is to give them something positive, he said.

The move seems designed to improve IAB Europe’s research activities. It will now get its hands on Mediascope Europe and Marketers’ Internet Ad Barometer, two EIAA reports that have become fixtures for online marketers.

EIAA’s executive director Alison Fennah becomes research and marketing VP for the combined organisation. EIAA’s public affairs VP Kimon Zorbas will continue in that role.

The group, which remains named “IAB Europe”, now counts 41 corporate members. Each group has campaigned in recent years on issues including self-regulation on behavioural targeting.

– Apple’s Data Center: With the launch of a 505,000-square-foot space in North Carolina to host Apple’s data due to launch this spring, the analysts at Bernstein have made some educated guesses about how it might get used (via ATD):

- Running a bigger iAd system. Given the growth of iOS devices in the year ahead, Apple might use the capacity in NC to handle for ad serving.

- Enhancing MobileMe. This is the perennial favorite of cloud-based media supporters. Apple would extend its back-up system to include backing up media files and being able to use them across multiple devices.

- iTunes subscriptions. Another idea that’s been kicking around the blogosphere, this would potentially pit Apple up against the likes of Spotify or Mog in this pay-once, listen-a-lot streaming music services that we are increasingly seeing on the market.

- Video streaming. Similar iTunes streaming, and competing against the likes of Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) and Netflix.

- Voice interface and navigation. This is the least reported of these ideas but an interesting one. As the report notes, it would play on Apple’s acquisitions of voice-powered “assistant” Siri and mapping company PlaceBase, and rival the kinds of voice-recognition and naviation/mapping services being developed by the likes of Google (NSDQ: GOOG). Sticking in my mind here, too, is the slip by Steve Wozniak earlier this year, saying Apple bought the voice recognition company Nuance (something he later admitted was wrong). That does make one wonder just how much Apple really is thinking about voice and how to use it to improve the iOS experience.

– Mobile ad trends: Some numbers out from the IAB and PwC on mobile advertising in the UK.

In 2010, advertisers spent a total of £83 million ($136 million) on mobile advertising. That’s still a small number, but it does represent growth of 116 percent over 2009 (and comparing 2009 to 2008, the sum grew by only 32 percent.

And despite all the attention that mobile apps are getting — and the subsequent attention on advertising as a way of generating revenue from mobile apps — the bulk of revenues are still coming from mobile search ads, which accounted for £54.9 million ($90 million) of total revenues, a growth of 172 percent. Display advertising is still smaller but it’s also growing (which should come as good news to companies like Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) that focus on display ads in mobile): they accounted for £28.1 million ($46 million) in revenues, a rise of 61 percent.

Entertainment and Media remains the single biggest vertical for ad spend, accounting for 32.9 percent of total revenues.

This is only the third year that the IAB has been keeping records on mobile ad spend.

– Mobile cloud services: Two new services out from vendors that are looking to tap into the move of developers to use cloud-based services when developing mobile apps.

- mBlox has launched a service that lets developers push apps and data updates for apps based on parameters such as location, signal strength, and the battery strength of a particular device; the system can also send data to “wake up” dormant apps. Developers can use interactive tools then to monitor how the campaign or data spread is progressing, as well as monitor any financial transactions that get made as a result.

- appMobi’s SDK, which it has branded its XDK, is the other cloud-based app development offering launched this week.This one covers one-touch mobile payments, which can be used for web purchases as well as physical goods; more push notifications based on device/geography; more analytics; and the ability to push app updates without having to update via an app store.

“The partners will build prototypes for the cloud radio project, with a view to developing a working product by next year,” says the announcement.

“The focus for Apollo will be to develop next-generation personal radio and music services that can work across any internet-connected device, such as mobiles, tablets and web TVs. Potential plans could include using Facebook’s API to tap into data and creating hybrid services that combine personalised music and audio information.”

We 7 appears to be a lead partner and could be a gainer. The unlimited-music service repositioned in November to place more emphasis on “radio”, having concluded that consumers prefer hearing unprogrammed streams of relevant music than picking from a neverending catalogue of available tunes. Apollo would seem to be an enlargening of that idea.

We 7 was also already allied with Yahoo, which it last year tapped to handle its ad sales around its music streams.

Somethin’ Else digital director Paul Bennun: “Wouldn’t it be useful to get traffic updates on your car radio saying the roundabout up ahead is blocked? With location sensitivity, we’ll be able to editorialise audio content that would help you know that.”

While many media are now being reborn as TCP/IP carriers and although in-home radio over WiFi is emminently possible, out-of-home internet radio whilst on the move is a significant challenge.

According to sources familiar with the situation, Rothenberg resigned this morning and his departure will be announced shortly. He is leaving on good terms.

Update: The IAB, which spent months looking for a replacement, has announced Rothenberg’s return as president and CEO. Rothenberg led the industry group for four years before taking the job as chief digital officer and EVP at Time Inc. The same press release underscores Time Inc’s commitment to IAB — plus some sweetner, including funding for an “upcoming cross-industry measurement initiative” and charter sponsorship of the upcoming IAB Ad Lab.

Time Inc. has no plans to replace Rothenberg. The thinking is something like this: he could make the role work but it’s not clear it makes sense to put someone else in there given the strength of the current digital leaders like recently promoted Fran Hauser and John Cantarella. Rothenberg had a very small operation — two direct reports — and told me earlier this month he planned to rely on a digital leadership council to work with the units and publications.

Meanwhile, here’s the memo that just went out to the whiplashed Time Inc. staff from the committee of three running the publisher until a new CEO is appointed, which also takes great pains to stress how much they wanted Rothenberg to stay:

FROM: Howard Averill, Maurice Edelson and John Huey
RE: Randall Rothenberg

Randall Rothenberg informed us today that he has accepted an offer to return to the Interactive Advertising Bureau as its President and Chief Executive Officer.

Randall joined us a month ago as our first Chief Digital Officer and moved quickly to develop relationships and coordinate opportunities across Time Inc. We considered him a valued and collegial member of our management team and hoped he would stay.

Randall’s departure will be mitigated by his assurances that he will continue to work closely with Time Inc.

“Time Inc. is a valued member of the IAB, and as I return to that industry leadership role, I look forward to helping the teams here as you continue your digital transformation,” Randall said today. “I was attracted to Time Inc. by its fantastic brands and terrific people, and believe that the company is well positioned to take advantage of the digital revolution in media and marketing.”

Getting to know Randall better has been a great benefit to Time Inc., and partially as a result we are redoubling our commitment to the IAB. We are pleased to announce that Time Inc. will become a charter sponsor of the association’s new IAB Ad Lab and of the IAB’s important cross-industry measurement standardization initiative, where we will take an advisory board seat. We also will continue our participation on the IAB’s Board of Directors and on its Mobile Marketing Center of Excellence. These positions will give the company and our executives access to the best thinking in the industry.

We wish Randall the best at the IAB.

More to come.

To one degree or another, the blogging, downloading and streaming services offered by these entities presents a “degree of openness” that can be raised or lowered depending on the whims of individual operators. Aside from that, the openness does not extend to advertisers who reach various audiences across all these devices. Online advertising depends on click-throughs, ad networks, analytics, search-engine optimization being standardized and connected, Rothenberg says, citing Forrester’s Josh Bernoff. With more devices having their own disconnected standards, online advertising will only become more splintered, since separate kinds of ads that conform to the unique properties of each system and device.

Rothenberg is particularly concerned about the iPad’s incompatibility with Adobe (NSDQ: ADBE) Flash, which is the basis of most display ad campaigns. While Bernoff shrugs and says this is the way of the world, Rothenberg does have some suggestions for reducing the walled-gardens that exist between the various systems.

He proposes a “supply chain détente” where the device marketers establish a single standard that will make it easy for advertisers to create seamless campaigns across all platforms. In the meantime, publishers can’t wait around for the gated communities to fall apart. Media companies have to ramp up their own individual marketing services programs to find other ways of drawing in ad revenue and supporting their businesses.

– Better ad performance: Casual and in-game ads turn out higher engagement stats than standard banners — and they’re cheaper than search ads. A recent Kia campaign on Xbox Live, for example, netted ad click-through rates (CTRs) that were 840 percent higher than the company’s corresponding display ads — with average costs per click (CPCs) nearly 60 percent lower than search ads.

— Expanding (ad-friendly) demographics: Gamers aren’t just the 18-year-old guys playing World of Warcraft or Halo. The average game player is actually 35 — and a quarter of all games are played by people over 50. Meanwhile, 40 percent of all gamers are women. And it’s this “broad demographic appeal” that appears to be increasing marketers’ appetites for in-game ads, Mahaney wrote.

Photo Credit: RebeccaPollard