Online advertising – display, classified and search - in Australia surged 24% last year to reach $5.9 billion in value throughout 2015.
The growth, reported by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC) in their online advertising expenditure report, marks yet another year the industry has achieved double digital year-on-year growth of at least 21% since 2010.
Mobile advertising expenditure delivered the largest growth in 2015, hitting $695 million (up 81%) on 2014 figures to reach $1.55 billion, with 65% of spend on smartphones and 35% on tablets. Mobile advertising now accounts for 40% of all General Display advertising, up from 25.5% in 2014.
Video advertising saw significant growth of more than 75% for the year, reaching $484 million in 2015, up from $276.5 million in 2014. It now accounts for 23% of General Display advertising.
General Display grew 46% to reach $2.1 billion; Classified advertising increased 22% to top $1.1 billion, while Search and Directories recorded 14% growth to reach $2.8 billion.
“This is an outstanding result for the industry,” says IAB CEO Alice Manners. “When the IAB first started recording online ad expenditure just nine years ago it was at $1.3 billion and today we are poised to break the $6 billion barrier.
“We have come a long way, but there is still much room for improvement and we are already looking forward to the next major milestone being achieved.”
Retail, Real Estate and Motor Vehicles continue to dominate the General Display share of advertising. Real Estate posted the largest gain of share, growing 12.2% in 2015. Motor Vehicles advertising slipped back just under one percent of its category share to hold 17.2% of General Display dollars, while Retail maintained its share at 10.1%, just ahead of Finance which decreased to an 8.7% of Display advertising.
Email Nicola at nicolariches@yaffa.com.au.