2021 Comeback for the Aussie Digital Ad Market

2021 Comeback for the Aussie Digital Ad Market

27 May 2021 |

Media and Advertising Industry

The Australian digital advertising market has seen a record 25.8% year-on year revenue increase, following the March quarter of 2021. The market hit $2.883 billion last quarter, according to the IAB Australia Online Advertising Expenditure Report (OAER), prepared by PwC.

The numbers paint a hopeful picture for the industry after the COVID-19 pandemic affected consumer confidence and impacted advertising reliance by businesses. All three digital advertising categories, search and directories, general display and classifieds saw over 15% growth. General display boasted the most growth, with a 28.9% increase from last year. Search and directories saw a 25.8% increase, accounting for $2,883 Million revenue. Classifieds recorded a 18.5% growth.

IAB Australia CEO Gai Le Roy said the report clearly indicates that the market is rebounding and experiencing a comeback in 2021. “Digital advertising continues apace and we’re seeing a diversification of that spend into a broader range of opportunities across different digital offerings.”

The top five industry share categories included retail, automotive, finance, real estate and FMCG. Retail and finance both experienced a share growth from 2020, with retail growing exponentially, now holding 16.4% of expenditure. Real estate and FMCG share have plateaued, with automotive being the only of the top categories to see a decrease in share from 13.8% to 12.5%.

“There’s no doubt the Australian market is bouncing back but there’s still plenty of room for further growth, with expectations that as borders reopen and supply chains improve, both the travel and automotive categories will increase the investment in digital advertising.” said Le Roy. With Australian domestic (and some international) travel returning this year, travel advertising is beginning to recover and has seen an increase of expenditure this year.

When it came to video advertising, total expenditure saw a slight decrease compared to the 2020 period. Accounting for $572 million in the March quarter, this didn’t quite match the $645m figure from last year, at its record height. Programmatic trading of video content, however, did increase this year. Programmatic trading peaked at 61% of total expenditure, compared to 34% of content bought through agencies.

Reach out to your ADMATICian if you would like to know more about where digital advertising is headed in 2021. Click here to download the full IAB report.