Trump’s general election brawl to drive record advertising

Big news: The video ad market for politics is expected to grow by $2B (↑ 50%) between 2018 and 2020!!!  The total spend will approach $6B during the 2020 cycle accounting for ≈ 4-5% of the total U.S. video ad market and 17% of the entire growth.

What is different about this report?  Our team at Cross Screen Media partnered with the team at Advertising Analytics to build out the first estimate in politics that was video only.  This difference matters because we are now able to estimate how much money is spent purely on persuading voters and the answer is a whole lot of

Quote from Kyle Roberts – CEO @ Advertising Analytics:“This is the first time that digital persuasion video has been isolated and aligned, meaning we can compare what’s happening on TV directly to what’s happening online,”

Presidential cycle political video ad spending according to Advertising Analytics/Cross Screen Media (% growth):
1) 2016 – $2.2B
2) 2020P – $5.9B (↑ 170%)

Midterm cycle political video ad spending (% growth):
1) 2014 – $1.6B
2) 2018 – $3.9B (↑ 142%)

Share by platform in 2020P:
1) Local Broadcast TV – 55% (↓ 9%)
2) Digital Video – 27% (↑ 8%)
3) Local Cable TV – 17% (↑ 1%)

Local broadcast TV spend by cycle (% growth):
1) 2014 – $1.3B
2) 2016 – $1.7B (↑ 33%)
3) 2018 – $2.5B (↑ 46%)
4) 2020P – $3.3B (↑ 29%)

Local cable TV spend by cycle (% growth):
1) 2014 – $320M
2) 2016 – $450M (↑ 41%)
3) 2018 – $660M (↑ 47%)
4) 2020P – $1.0B (↑ 55%)

Local cable share of TV only spend by cycle:
1) 2014 – 20%
2) 2016 – 21%
3) 2018 – 21%
4) 2020P – 24%

Digital video spend by cycle (% growth):
1) 2018 – $740M
2) 2020P – $1.6B (↑ 116%)

Digital share for presidential for primary vs. general:
1) General election – 30%
2) Primary election – 29%

Why this matters: If you believe the news, then the Democrat primary for president will be fueled by younger (digital) voters, but we project that Democrat campaigns will spend 71% of their persuasion budget on local broadcast/cable TV ads.  If this is correct, then they are making a bet that the majority of turnout is older (TV).

Estimated number of TV ad airings by cycle (% growth):
1) 2018 – 5.5M
2) 2020P – 8.0M (↑ 46%)

The big question: Do you want to sell more political ads in 2020?  If yes, then download our FREE 10-page report and let’s get started!

Podcast: Does Political Advertising Move the Needle?

More #1: Kantar study: Brands will struggle to compete with political ad spending during 2020 US election

More #2: Political Audience Viewership Of First Democratic Debate

More #3: Dems prepare 9-figure ad onslaught to blunt Trump’s head start

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