Advertising spend as defined by media agency bookings fell 3.8% in September compared to a record in 2022 when the market topped $800 million a month for the first time.
A one-off boost from campaigns related to the Voice referendum wasn't enough to slow the decline, according to the latest numbers from the Standard Media Index (SMI).
SMI AU/NZ managing director Jane Ractliffe says September 2023 total was still the second largest in the index's 16 years of data history.
"While the headline number shows a decline against a particularly strong prior year period, the market remains 0.6% larger than in the pre-COVID September 2019 period with most product categories having returned to the pre-COVID level," she says.
Outdoor has again emerged as the market’s largest growth media in in September with revenue up 12.4% year-on-year, while cinema ad spend also continues to grow, up 17.1%.
"And obviously key media are continuing to deliver strong growth, with outdoor lifting its share of total ad spend by 1.7 percentage points year-on-year to now represent 13.5% of all Agency ad spend," says Ractliffe.
"Outdoor’s COVID recovery is accelerating as new inventory comes online and as key categories move share from the TV and Digital media.’’
The value of total television bookings was down 8.3%. Within that subscription TV direct continued its strong growth and regional TV was flat .
The largest percentage growth of any product category this month was the Political Parties/Industry Associations/Unions category as campaigns ramped up prior to the Voice referendum.
This category reported a 72% year-on-year increase in ad spend in September with TV, Outdoor and Radio gaining the majority of the extra ad spend.
However this was offset by the continuing decline in Consumer Electronics ad spend and a large fall in Retail category ad spend, mostly due to lower media investment from the Hardware and Alcoholic Retailer subcategories.
In the July to September quarter, the market is now back just 1.5% on last year’s record.
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