Location targeting has become an essential component of mobile marketing campaigns, with 80 per cent of marketers using it to reach specific audiences as part of their brand efforts.

Audience targeting is the most popular form of location targeting, according to research by global location marketplace xAd, followed by proximity targeting, where marketers attempt to reach people close to specific businesses or points of interest.

The report also revealed the importance of mobile in marketing overall, with two-thirds of marketers believing their audience is or soon will be engaged by mobile marketing, and every region expecting mobile ad spend to increase over the next year.

Over half of ad agencies and marketers view mobile as a significant priority for future planning, with 25 per cent of ad agencies and 20 per cent of consumer-facing brands reporting it as their top marketing priority.

As many previous surveys have shown, measurement remains a key limiting factor to marketers embracing mobile, with 30 per cent saying that the inability to measure success was their top concern with mobile advertising, but xAd feels that locations ability to create mobile-first attribution models will have a great impact on marketer confidence.

“Around the world, marketing and ad agency leaders have realised that the power of mobile advertising will be unlocked by the context of the consumer,” said Theo Theodorou, head of EMEA at xAd . “Knowing the places people visit is the best indicator of consumer intent, and location data takes that one step further by enabling marketers to use those insights to engage people.”

“This research from xAd emphasises the central role mobile plays in the modern marketers role,” said Jonathan Mew, chief operating officer at IAB UK. “This rapid growth has much to do with the unique technology that mobile offers to advertisers, such as location. Location technology gives markets a layer of relevance, context and data that will no doubt push mobile ad spend past the £2bn mark in the UK in 2015.”