The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) released a new study conducted by Ovum looking at over 200 brand marketers and their perceptions of mobile advertising. It found that most (76%) perceive programmatic buying to be an important development in mobile advertising, but that few are currently buying programmatically.

According to the study, two in five (41%) marketers said mobile programmatic advertising would help them reach their target audiences, but only 27% are actually buying inventory that way. 18% use private exchanges and 17% use open exchanges. Some use both.

“It is clear that programmatic advertising is strongly embedded in the minds of many mobile marketers,” said Anna Bager, SVP, Mobile and Video at the IAB. “However, there is still much work to be done before mobile programmatic can reach its full potential. IAB is committed to educating mobile marketers about the benefits of this growing format and, towards that end, recently released a Mobile Programmatic Playbook. Our efforts on the mobile programmatic front have only just begun, and we look forward to increased adoption as familiarity improves.”

73% said they’re interested in connected TV advertising opportunities, while 69% are interested in opportunities in cars. 66% are interested in wearables. The IAB notes that mobile marketers that rate themselves as being “fairly or very experienced” at mobile see greater potential for these platforms (80% connected TVs, 78% connected cars, 75% wearables).

Here’s a look at buying habits:

The study found that 65% have been spending more on mobile over the past two years, and 9% have increased their mobile budget by over 50%. Budgets being affected by mobile ad substitution include PC/desktop digital (31%), TV (31%), Outdoor (20%), and Radio (18%).

87% of marketers say they’re satisfied or fairly satisfied with the performance of their mobile ads, while 8% say they’re completely satisfied. 14% expect their companies’ mobile ad budgets to increase by over half in the next two years. 57% they expect them to rise by under half.

Privacy concerns remain with 37% indicating privacy is a very important issue compared to 22% in 2013. Other concerns include device operating system fragmentation, lack of standardized metrics for measurement, lack of agency expertise in mobile, and there being too many different ways to source or buy mobile inventory.

“With mobile taking a more prominent role in consumers’ lives each year, an uptick in marketers’ potential concerns surrounding mobile privacy is no surprise,” said Mike Zaneis, EVP, Public Policy, and General Counsel at the IAB. “The IAB is in full support of the Digital Advertising Alliance’s work on this front. Its recent release of new user-friendly tools for mobile choice and transparency brings new level of consumer control to the fast-growing mobile medium.”

Here’s a word cloud looking at thoughts on the state of mobile advertising on one word:

It looks like advertisers are pretty optimistic.

You can find the study here.

Images via IAB/Ovum