European ad impressions to smartphones almost doubled in just 90 days, InMobi says

InMobi, the world’s largest independent mobile advertising network, has released new data revealing that its mobile display ad impressions have grown 36% in the most recent quarter of 2011, with the most notable jump being a 97% increase ads served to smartphones in Europe.

InMobi says that the sharp increase means that it served 21.9 billion impressions in Q3 in Europe. That compares to an increase of 39% in North America, where InMobi served 32.5 billion impressions across the quarter.

Although the report only features data for InMobi’s own network, the company reaches 340 million consumers and serves over 60.2 billion ad impressions per month globally, making it a useful yardstick for the market as a whole.

Europe’s steep growth in smartphone ad impressions led it to a 53% increase in total mobile ad impressions. Smartphones leapt from accounting for 51% of impressions to 71%. That’s the same figure as in North America, although there’s only been a two percentage point increase there – it was 69% last quarter. Globally, smartphones are still a small proportion of the mobile ad market, accounting for 39%.

Globally, Apple’s iPhone 4 is the top handset being served with InMobi’s ads, with a 4% share. The same handset accounts for 7.1% in Europe and 6.2% in North America. That said, despite its troubles this year, Nokia remains the dominant manufacturer, with a 31% share globally. It’s a different story in North America, where Apple comes out on top with a 20% share, and Europe where Samsung is dominant, holding 18%.

Meanwhile, ads served to Android grew significantly in Q3 2011, with a six percentage point increase.

With the worldwide smartphone market growing, there’s little surprise that the mobile advertising market is developing fast too. Advertisers ignoring mobile clearly do so at their peril.

Infographics for the global report, Europe and North America are all below.