The advertising market, as defined by media agency bookings, softened in May as federal election-related demand subsided.
Guideline SMI numbers show ad spend down -7.2% compared to the same month last year.
But that deficit should be reduced with late digital media bookings to come.
“In previous elections we’ve usually seen a strong spike in government category advertising ahead of the election, but this year was remarkably different with government bookings down 29.0% in May and back 27% in the current January to May period compared to the last election year of 2022,’’ said Guideline SMI APAC managing mirector Jane Ractliffe.
And across the calendar year-to-date period total bookings are up by 3% - or almost $100 million - ahead of the same period last year
In May, outdoor ad spend was up 4.6% driven by higher posters/billboards ad spend.
Cinema jumped 12.8%.
Magazines kept above the line, up 0.9%, with growth at both the trade and consumer magazine sectors.
Ractliffe said retail and automotive brand categories recorded double-digit declines, having an outsized impact on the market given their sheer volume of ad spend.
But if those declines are removed, along with government, then underlying demand for the month is back just $10 million.
TV Streaming/Video sites jumped 7.8% and retail online revenues were also up significantly.
But the issue with late bookings is highlighted by programmatic ad spend so far being back 13.4% and search ad spend back 9.3%.
Also in May, ad spend to digital content sites grew by 1.2%, boosted by election bookings flowing to the Nine and News Corp news media websites.
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