Ad Market Sees First Dip In Two Years In July, But Digital Grows Strongly.

The U.S. ad market entered the second half with a dip in spending, the first monthly decline in nearly two years. The ad tracking firm Guideline reports that total spending decreased 5.6% in July compared to a year earlier. It is the first time the monthly index showed a drop since March 2023, although it remains too soon to know whether it was a one-month blip tied to bumpiness in the economy, or an indication of a larger pullback by advertisers.

The biggest ad categories that may be most susceptible to the tariffs and consumers holding back drove the advertising softness. Guideline says top 10 category spending declined 6.2% in July. That compared to a 4.8% decrease for all other ad categories.

For broadcasters looking to make up any cuts on the traditional side, the message is a familiar one—look online. Guideline says July’s bright spot was digital advertising, where spending increased 6.4% year-over-year. But it says traditional spending had a particularly tough month, as its number show spending fell by a third. The result was digital’s share of total ad spending rose to 78% in July, which was five points higher than in June.

Guideline’s U.S. Ad Market Tracker is a composite monthly index from Standard Media Index, designed to provide a real-world measure of U.S. ad spending, based on actual invoiced media buys, including radio, from the major agencies and their clients. As such, it is mostly representative of spending by larger national advertisers.

The data is powered by Standard Media Index (SMI) and covers radio, television, digital, print, and out-of-home media types. It is based on actual spending data from the SMI pool partners at major holding companies and large ad agencies, representing 95% of all U.S. national brand ad spending.

See Guideline’s U.S. Ad Market Tracker HERE.