Media Buying

In terms of the allocations of spend across industries, 2020 will be a story of two trends. On one hand, digital ad investments (and advertising investments overall, for that matter) in some sectors will decline immensely as a result of those industries facing insurmountable barriers. On the other, the pandemic will allow certain other industries to remain resilient in terms of digital spend, with relatively strong growth forecasts for the year. It comes as no surprise that the automotive and travel industries will experience huge spending declines in 2020. As the UK imposed strict lockdown rules, pretty much all travel was nixed for several months. Investment in digital advertising by these two industries will thus suffer, with spend declining by 20.4% for auto and by 36.7% for travel this year.

The retail industry will continue to lead the pack in terms of digital ad spend in 2020, and the lockdown has helped retail solidify its position. This year, UK digital ad spending in the retail sector will reach £3.02 billion ($3.85 billion).

Yes, it's really happening: The cookie-less future is on the way. Allison Schiff, senior editor at AdExchanger, joins eMarketer principal analyst at Insider Intelligence Nicole Perrin to discuss what's been going on at the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), what advertisers need to know about FLoCs of birds, and how optimistic they are about educating consumers about targeted advertising.

Addressable advertising relies on being able to identify users to serve them the right message at the right time. But the identifiers that marketers use to do this are coming under threat as platforms and regulators work to improve data privacy and protection practices for consumers—namely by killing the third-party tracking cookie.

The pandemic has had all kinds of effects on consumers, and in turn, on how they interact with products and services. eMarketer principal analyst at Insider Intelligence Nicole Perrin speaks with fellow principal analyst Andrew Lipsman and forecasting analyst Eric Haggstrom about what happens when business metrics go haywire, including at Walmart, Nike, and Peloton. They also talk about Facebook's narrowing attribution window, Prime Day finally happening, and Samsung Ads' new self-serve demand-side platform option.

No industry has been as devastated by the coronavirus pandemic and its effects as travel. Airlines, car rental agencies, hotels and resorts, online booking services, cruises and destination marketing organizations, and business travel support services found their operations ground to a near-halt for much of Q2 2020, and the situation has barely improved in H2.

As much as consumer behavior and the wider economic situation influence the app economy, Apple and Google do as well. With their commissions on in-app purchases (IAPs) and subscriptions, and with their rules surrounding data and advertising, they can make or break different monetization strategies. The changes set to take effect in early 2021 under Apple’s iOS 14, especially, have upended app monetization.

Despite general pullback in digital ad spending across many industries this year, the healthcare and pharma industry will increase its digital ad spend by 14.2% to reach $9.53 billion. This will make it the fastest-growing industry after computing products and consumer electronics, we forecast.

One of the unique qualities of retail media advertising is the ability to use closed-loop attribution, tying ad engagements to sales. This is possible because the same company is running the ad and selling the product advertised. Brands often look to Amazon and Walmart.com because those sites facilitate closed-loop attribution—and with the ongoing disruptions to digital identity, this tool will likely provide even greater advantages to those who use it.

eMarketer vice president of content studio at Insider Intelligence Paul Verna steps in once again in as host of this week's "The Weekly Listen," where he and eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver and junior analyst at Insider Intelligence Blake Droesch discuss TV ad spending and subscription video-on-demand services during the pandemic, deepfake video technology, the new app tax from Apple, streaming services and the "positive" addition to a lot of their names, and foul-mouthed fowl.

Amid disinformation campaigns over the coronavirus pandemic and the upcoming presidential election, most US buy-side decision-makers are concerned about their ads potentially running up against controversial content on social media.

Programmatic transparency has come a long way in recent years, with many supply-side platforms (SSPs) now offering an interface for buyers to get log-level data. Amanda Martin, vice president of enterprise partnerships at Goodway Group, joins eMarketer principal analyst at Insider Intelligence Nicole Perrin to discuss why buyers are interested in this information, what is still making it difficult to understand and execute on, and her hopes for the future of transparency.

Programmatic podcast ad spending, which we are forecasting for the first time this year, is growing at a fast rate from a small base.

When it comes to protecting users’ personal information and providing a safe online environment, social network users in the US give lower marks to Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter.

We forecast that US travel digital ad spending will drop by 41.0% this year to just $3.24 billion. No other industry will decline as fast or spend as little.

The US computing products & consumer electronics industry will be the fastest growing digital ad spender in 2020, increasing its spend by 18.0% in a year when the total US digital ad market will only grow by 1.7%.

eMarketer forecasting analyst Eric Haggstrom, junior forecasting analyst Zachary Goldner, and principal analyst Nicole Perrin discuss the evolving landscape of advertising through connected TV devices and how Roku stands out from the competition. They then talk about when we may see a return to pre-pandemic advertising budgets, the importance of earning consumer trust during data collection, and what happened to ad blocking.

eMarketer forecasting analysts Eric Haggstrom and Peter Vahle and vice president of content studio at Insider Intelligence Paul Verna discuss the future of the movie theater. Will movies make a comeback and what will they look like? They then talk about HBO Max with ads, AT&T's possible wireless phone plans subsidized by ads, and Apple One subscription bundles.

While it’s too soon to bid adieu to the aspirational influencer, it’s clear that the pandemic has humbled many of even the most polished creators.

The US telecom industry has long been an advertising behemoth. While the telecom space has fewer companies than any of the other industries we track, these players are almost all huge spenders.