• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, August 6, 2015

Ad executives by and large say they have a relatively low understanding of the "Internet of Things" (IoT), but they all see it growing in importance over the next several years and that it will begin to impact many facets of the way they engage with and understand consumers.

Those are the top findings from a survey that Advertiser Perceptions Inc. conducted among advertisers and agency executives exclusively for MediaPost.

Interestingly, only about a quarter of the respondents indicated they had a good or extremely good knowledge about IoT, about the same share that said they had little or no knowledge about it.

The biggest sector -- about 40% of respondents -- said they were somewhere in the middle. The numbers were almost equally divided between agency and advertiser executives.

Overall, advertisers and agencies agreed on the importance of IoT growing over time, but the one area where they differed significantly is where IoT will have the greatest impact.

The greatest number of marketers (33%) see IoT’s impact as being new ways of tracking or collecting information about consumers. That was followed by 31% who said it represents new ways of delivering a “brand experience.”

Agencies, by contrast, were much more bullish on the opportunity for IoT to develop new ways of delivering a brand message (25% of agency respondents vs. 18% of marketers).

How IoT will play out, and how it is even defined, will be the subject of a MediaPost conference taking place today in New York City, which will focus primarily on IoT’s impact on “shopping.”