The federal election campaign is forecast to lift advertising spend by around 20 per cent over the campaign period, which kicked off last Friday and will run until the polls on 3 May.
GroupM’s ANZ chief investment officer Melissa Hey told B&T that the 2025 federal election will “undoubtedly impact the advertising landscape” but it could lead to cost increases and inventory constraints across the market.
“We expect increased demand for advertising inventory, particularly in television and digital channels, and we anticipate biddable channels being as much impacted as non-biddable,” Hey said.
“We’re likely to see the biggest growth in digital addressable platforms where political parties can target specific electorates with a bespoke message.
“Marketers should anticipate a more competitive environment, be prepared for shifts in audience attention as the election cycle progresses, and plan accordingly.”
Hey said that brands are turning to influencers on social media as an effective way to reach consumers as traditional media advertising space is being bombarded by political ads.
She urges marketers to stay agile, adaptable and focused on reaching target audiences to navigate the election period.
“The key is to maintain a consistent brand presence while being mindful of the heightened media environment,” she added.
“This could involve diversifying the media mix, optimising existing campaigns, exploring innovative content strategies, or focusing on channels less impacted by political advertising.”
What are parties currently spending?
The media agencies representing the major parties include Mindshare and Sparro by Brainlads (Labor) and Atomic 212 (LNP).
Political parties are already ramping up to advertising to get their election messages across. From Thursday, 1 May, parties can’t run ads on broadcast radio and TV due to an advertising blackout.
TV and radio spend always scales up during an election campaign, as per SMI’s figures, but the full amount won’t be revealed until after the election.
“The higher Government category spend added an extra $12 million to the market in February, but SMI’s Forward Pacings data – which tracks confirmed future ad spend across all product categories – shows that now the election has been called, more of the demand is moving from the Government category to the Political Parties/Industry Associations in March and April,’’ Guideline SMI APAC managing director Jane Ractliffe said.
“Already we can see political parties spending an extra $8 million on TV in March and an extra $6 million in April, and that’s pushed total ad demand for March an extra 10 percentage points above where we saw future demand at the same time last year.’’
An increasing amount of money is being shifted to social media channels, in particular Meta platforms.
Meta’s platforms are a popular place to run political ads due to the ability to hyper-target messaging to individuals in specific geographies (seats). Conversely TikTok doesn’t run paid political ads, although politicians run organic posts to reach younger voters, a tactic that Keir Starmer’s Labour Party used to good effect in last year’s UK federal election.
During the 2022 federal election, political parties spent at least $12.5 million on Facebook and Instagram advertising in the final two months of the election campaign, with Labor and the Greens successfully engaging women voters to a far higher degree than the Coalition, according to The Australian Institute.
This time around, the Liberal National Party ($297,236) and the Australian Labor Party ($108,284) have spent $405,530 with Meta in the month prior to Anthony Albanese shooting the firing gun on Friday, according to Meta’s Ad Library.
Climate 200, which funds the Teals, spent $285,627 during this period, while Clive Palmer’s Trumpets of Patriots spent $122,000, although is spending more on Snapchat and YouTube.
The real race begins now for political parties, their advertising strategies and spend.
