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Forecast: Political Ad Spending To Top $12 Billion; Most Will Go To Traditional Media.

Writer's picture: Inside Audio MarketingInside Audio Marketing

It is the calm before the political storm.


The 2024 presidential primaries may not be generating all that much ad spending, but a new political advertising forecast from eMarketer says 2024 will bring record amounts of investment with a lot of dollars being spent in new ways. The overall number is impressive enough on its own. If eMarketer’s prediction holds true, total political ad spending will reach $12.3 billion this year, a 29% increase from the last presidential election year in 2020 and nearly triple the $4.25 billion that was spent in 2016.


“This year’s election cycle will be the costliest in U.S. history. At over $12 billion, it will be the first year to breach the $10 billion threshold, per our forecast,” analyst Paul Verna writes in a new report.


Verna says digital will continue to grab a bigger portion of political spending, especially connected TV (CTV) which is forecast to take one of every two dollars spent online in 2024. Yet eMarketer’s outlook says traditional media will still get the biggest cut of political ad spending, led by television.


“Political advertising is growing and changing,” Verna says. “This year, these advertisers will continue to direct the bulk of their budgets to linear TV, but they will also capitalize on the refined targeting capabilities of CTV and social media as they grow their investments in those venues.”


The report says digital will have a 28% share of total political ad budgets this year, or just under $3.5 billion. That is roughly ten-times larger than it was in 2016 when an estimated $350 million was spent online. Digital’s share has also essentially doubled during that time.


Television has long been a top destination for candidates, and that video medium’s dominance has translated online. With more people using streaming video services – eMarketer calculates the typical adult will spend more than two hours per day with CTV in 2024 – political ad buyers have followed. The firm forecasts CTV political ad spending will grow sixfold this year compared to 2020, predicting $1.56 billion will be invested in the media channel.


Yet when compared to marketing spending overall, political campaigns remain wedded to traditional media more than the typical ad buyer. According to eMarketer, 72% of political ad spending will go to traditional media channels like TV and radio this year, which is the opposite of overall ad spending, where digital will grab a 78% share. And as more is spent, more will go into traditional advertising.


“Traditional political ad spending will account for 10% of all traditional media spending this year, a new high,” says Verna. In the report, eMarketer says traditional political advertising allocations will total $8.9 billion, an eight percent increase between 2020 and 2024. That contrasts with a 4.8% increase in overall ad spending on radio.


The forecast says political ad spending on social networks will jump 87% between 2020 and 2024. But eMarketer says many buyers remain skittish when it comes to social media. Verna says social media presents new “brand risks” as artificial intelligence makes it easy for misinformation and deepfakes to appear, along with relatively flat growth in social network users and time spent with the sites. These trends are causing many campaigns to be “circumspect” in how they approach social network political advertising. Verna says many campaigns are also redirecting social media ad dollars to CTV.

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