Chris "Coz" Costello, Senior Director of Marketing Research @ Skai™
Chris "Coz" Costello, Senior Director of Marketing Research @ Skai™
For those of you who are looking for signs that the advertising industry is coming out of the pandemic—congratulations! Marketers really picked up the pace in March. Whether it was greater volume, higher unit pricing or some combination of the two, spending increased across digital channels for many advertisers when compared to February.
For marketers, the new year means a new budget and new strategies to try. Then, by the end of February, practitioners have two months’ worth of campaign data to analyze, giving them a more definitive picture of how those new budgets and strategies are working in the real world. This clarity brings the confidence to make decisions on where to hit the gas and where to tap the brakes across their programs.
March is also the last month of the quarter—and because many companies put a heavy emphasis on quarterly reporting, while others might take a “use it or lose it” approach to quarterly budgets—the third month of each quarter offers marketers a final opportunity to positively impact their performance before the books close.
Before you go all-in on your Q2 plan, you might want to check out these benchmarks to see if your programs are on par with your industry peers or if you’re ahead or behind the curve.
This is a continuation of our monthly paid media snapshot series. As with any benchmark, your mileage may vary, but we hope this provides a bit more context for you as a marketer as you navigate the ups and downs of your program’s performance.
Methodology note. For the purpose of these monthly benchmarks, only Skai accounts with spend above a minimum threshold for the previous three months are included in this analysis.
Search budgets clearly picked up in March, with more than half of accounts spending more than in the previous month.
With the largest segment of search advertisers seeing no change in click prices from February to March, the growth in spending is coming from increased click volume.
Nearly half of social advertisers increased spending in March, with a very large segment of advertisers growing budgets by 50% or more.
The price of one thousand impressions increased for nearly two-thirds of social advertisers, making prices a key driver to higher spending levels.
Two-thirds of Retail Media advertisers spent more in March compared to February, reflecting the breakneck pace of growth of the channel.
Click prices for Retail Media ads were stable to slightly higher in March, which means the spending growth was largely a combination of both pricing and volume.
Come back in May for our next monthly trends post. Until then, you can dive into more of our research via our Quarterly Trends Reports hub.
And please visit the Skai blog and Research & Reports page for ongoing insights, analysis, and interviews on all things related to digital advertising.
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