IAB - Digital ad spend bounces back but still below pre pandemic

Chris Pash
By Chris Pash | 23 November 2020

Australian digital advertising bounced 11.3% higher to $2.26 billion in the September quarter growth compared to the three months to June, according to numbers from industry association IAB. 

However, Search (-6.9%) and Directories and Classifieds (-11.5%) were weaker than the same quarter in 2019. 

General Display revenue was marginally higher at 0.9% assisted by strong growth in video revenue. 

“It’s been a challenging year but the growth this quarter in terms of digital formats signals the industry is bouncing back," says Gai Le Roy, CEO of IAB Australia. 

"We are now entering what is traditionally considered the industry’s’ strongest quarter and we anticipate a continuation of the growth through to the end of the year.” 

The latest data is drawn from the IAB Australia Online Advertising Expenditure Report (OAER).  

Search and directories represented 45% of all expenditure and more than $1 billion in the September quarter, general display 38% and $871 million and classifieds 17% and $386 million. 

The general display formats of video (up 11%), standard display (10%), and infeed/native advertising (19%) all experienced double-digit quarter on quarter recovery. 

Video advertising is shifting towards pre-pandemic results with CTV inventory experiencing the highest growth across digital screens.  

Other findings from the IAB OAER Report from PwC for the September quarter: 

Retailers remained the number one investment industry and FMCG advertising has broken into the top five industries for general display expenditure for the first time since June 2017. 

iab sept q 2020 - industry

Advertisers’ buying preferences for content publishers’ inventory remained stable this quarter despite the uncertainty of the times, with 40% opting to buy via an agency, 16% direct, 11% via programmatic guaranteed and 33% via programmatic RTB/PMP.

iab sept q 2020 - content

Investment continues to trend towards Connected TV, shifting share from both desktop and mobile devices.

Mobile now represents 67% of general display advertising and 63% of search and directories.

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