Experiences refined for people
Digital Ad Spend in the U.S. will account for 54.2% of the estimated total ad spend in 2019, according to eMarketer’s latest forecast, winning the majority of U.S. advertising spend for the first time ever. Propelled largely by mobile advertising, which will make up two-thirds of the total digital spend, eMarketer projects advertisers will spend $129.34 billion on digital ads in 2019.
The forecast may not come as a surprise given digital advertising’s meteoric rise over the past several years, but it is a milestone moment for the industry as traditional ad spend officially takes a back seat to today’s data-rich, dynamic digital ad platforms.
Amazon will carve out the largest chunk of ad spend, providing advertisers hard-to-beat benefits for online shopping like real-time behavioral shopping data and the ability to target shoppers right on the “shelves” they are browsing. The two leading platforms, Google and Facebook, will continue to see revenue growth even while their market share declines to make way for Amazon and others.
Clearly, digital advertising is proving a worthy investment for brands across the board, but that doesn’t mean traditional media is going anywhere. Here are our three main takeaways for advertisers now that we’ve officially crossed into the majority digital age:
1. Take an Explorative Approach to Digital:
The number of digital options has exploded in recent years, providing advertisers more ways to reach their customers than ever before. If you have the resources, take advantage of today’s diverse landscape to find the channels that work for you by running exploratory campaigns on a variety of platforms rather than going all in on the latest media. Because digital often provides near instant feedback and more precise ROI tracking than traditional media, you can get a sense for what’s working quickly and invest with more confidence in the long run.
2. Invest in Holistic Digital Advertising Solutions:
Savvy digital advertisers are not only seeing the benefits of quantifiable results within a given channel, they’re seeking solutions that enable them to take what they’ve learned about their customers in one channel and leverage it to run more more effective campaigns across the board. At KORTX we aggregate data across the many channels our customers use via our Axon platform in order to better understand, build upon and convert audiences. Providing customers with that holistic approach to digital ad strategy is a large part of the reason we’re able to run campaigns that get more efficient with time.
3. Look Out For Newly Affordable Opportunities in Traditional Media:
Just because digital advertising has finally edged out traditional media spend doesn’t mean tv, radio and print ads are going away. The rush to digital is likely to catalyze some price flexibility on the traditional side that will lower the barrier to entry for brands who have been priced out in the past. Now may be a good time to circle back to tv or radio for that brand awareness campaign you’d been wanting to run.
Whether you're already a digital expert or just starting to explore, the KORTX team can help! Let us know how we can help you achieve the campaign results you need out of your digital strategy.
Here’s what we've been up to recently.
From us to your inbox weekly.
