Digital Ad Spending Continues to Rise

The advertising landscape is going through a transition where the spending on traditional platforms for advertising (TV and Print) are slowly shifting towards digital channels. Digital’s presence continues to rise, nearing 50% of the total share of advertising by 2020, projected to rise 6.5% from 2018’s 43.5% share. Globally, all ad spending will rise this year.

Traditional Advertising is Still Here

Despite the steady rise in digital media ad spend, there still exists a high level of trust in traditional ad formats. Print ads and TV ads, in terms of consumer trust, still rank highest, with radio ads trailing by roughly ten percentage points. Still, ads from search results are the most trusted among all the digital formats, according to polling by Marketing Sherpa. We expect the trust ratio to continue to shift higher for digital media as time passes.

According to a report by Rakuten Marketing, the delivery method in digital affects the perception of the ad. People favor online ads when they are useful, targeted to their interests, limited in frequency, and unobtrusive (they prefer native ads to pop-up ads).

Worldwide Growth in Ad Spending

This year, the presence of the FIFA World Cup (it’s in Russia this time around) will keep ad spending flowing for several regions, namely Latin America, where we’ll see nearly 9% growth this year. This is the case despite several markets in the region facing economic and political challenges. All in all, global ad spending is continuing its rising pace, at 5% yearly growth, projected through 2022. This year, that growth percentage is actually 7.4%, a bit higher than the continued projection for global ad spend growth.

Asia-Pacific Primed for Center-Stage

The fastest growing region, at 10.7% growth, is the Asia-Pacific market at $210 billion in ad spend. Together with North America, Asia-Pacific will account for 70.5% of global ad spend this year. One-third of the global ad business is in Asia, with China representing the lion’s share (45.5%) of the region’s spending. By comparison, the Western Europe market is on a growth rate of 2.8% this year.

North America is Still at the Top

This year, over half of all digital ad spending will exist on mobile (with mobile accounting for roughly 30% of total media advertising this year). This mobile ad spend is fueling North America’s numbers, with 37% of spend going toward mobile in this region. At over $230 billion, North America is still the largest market for ad spending.

What Does This Mean for Your Company?

Here at Exults, we’ve produced great results for our clients with their ad budgets. We’ve projected the yearly rise in ad spending simply by looking at our own results. Anticipating these shifts in advertising, we’ve positioned ourselves to take advantage of opportunities for growth in digital media. If you’re looking for a forward-thinking, results-oriented agency, reach out to Exults today.