Despite economic headwinds, the Australian online advertising market has continued to grow, reaching $3.455bn for the quarter ending 30 September, up 6.5 per cent on the same period last year (lead image: IAB Australia CEO Gai Le Roy).
The data comes from the IAB Australia Online Advertising Expenditure Report, prepared by PwC. The report showed that overall online advertising growth declined by 4.9 per cent, compared to the June 2022 quarter with advertiser spend across general display and search being pullback due to uncertain macroeconomic conditions.
Only classifieds saw spend increasing, up 4.7 per cent, thanks to record job ad volumes. General display advertising decreased 4.9 per cent in spend for the quarter, while search and directories decreased 8.4 per cent.
Classified advertising held 19 per cent share of spend ($644m), with search & directories at 42 per cent ($1.475m). General display held at 39 per cent ($1.336m).
Connected TV continued to grow its share of content publishers’ video revenue, rising to 49 per cent of spend, while desktop decreased slightly to 31 per cent and mobile held at 20 per cent.
Le Roy commented: “Overall the results for digital advertising investment were positive for the September quarter, with classified listings market being the standout performer driven in a large part by the employment market. The display market was softer than we have seen in previous quarters and while we are seeing some caution around marketing investment, the comparative quarter in 2021 was bolstered by Olympic-related ad dollars.”
Retail advertising remains top in terms of expenditure, while real estate and automotive remained in the top five ranking. Entertainment advertising entered the top five for expenditure, while spend on finance advertising decreased.
Agency’s share of content publishers inventory grew during the quarter across standard display, infeed, and video advertising. Programmatic trading and agencies buying ad space via an IO still lead the buying methods, there is a steady shift towards programmatic guaranteed deals, overtaking direct sales.
