The Impact of COVID-19 on Digital AdSpend

I recently attended an IAB UK Connected: Weekly Webinar.

That specific week they held a super webinar which revealed results of the IAB UK Annual Digital Adspend study. This aimed to show how the market evolved in 2019, prior to the impact of COVID-19 and the effect the virus has had.

What is Digital Adspend?

Digital Adspend measures the overall growth of digital advertising investment and compares how different environments, formats and devices have changed year on.

The Effect of COVID-19 and The Role of Social

During Covid-19, it’s clear there have been detrimental impact on revenues, with smaller businesses suffering greater impact. Results from the IAB study showed that companies saw an -11% drop in revenue from 2019-2020 (based on the study of 53 IAB members). If we look back at the digital ad spend analytics, results show a huge emphasis on the role of social coming to the forefront during this time of social distancing.

Some headlines from the study include;

• Total market figure 15.6bn (UK Digital Market 2019) 15.4% increase on 2018. These insights help businesses decide on areas to invest their marketing budget.

• Almost all growth from 2019 came from smartphone (Display & Search Advertising)

• Paid Search continues to rise

• Mobile Search has grown over recent years, in 2019 55% of search was through mobile.

• 70% of display ad revenue comes from smartphone & we don’t expect to see this trend slowing with 5G in the mix.

• Video is driving growth

• 58% of digital ad spend is made up of Social

• 90% of this ad spend is on Smartphone

The 2020 Forecast & Impact of COVID-19?

We have seen a slight decrease in digital ad spend due to the current situation, research shows a drop of 6.1% in Q1. The researchers from this study predict that Q2 will be worst hit. However, there’s light at the end of the tunnel. It’s thought that there will be a more upbeat end of 2020 in terms of digital ad spend & digital marketing.

Need help with your digital ads?

Get in touch with us today and let’s have a chat about digital ads. For more information on IAB UK, head over to their website!