Cheers to a happy new year, local advertising specialists! And the new year just got even happier. BIA Advisory Services has increased its 2022 U.S. Local Advertising Forecast estimate to $173.3 billion! That’s $11.8 billion higher than BIA initially estimated back in the summer of 2021. The estimate for 2022 is also 11.4% higher than the estimate for 2021. Why? It’s “due to faster than anticipated growth in digital advertising and a strong political year,” says BIA. Here’s what you need to take advantage of this golden opportunity.

Local Advertising in 2022

The COVID-​19 Effect

First of all, yes, BIA has taken pandemic induced factors into consideration when crafting their local advertising revenue estimate. BIA took both pandemic-​related stalls in advertising, as well as inflation and supply chain problems into account. The end result is one the company is “bullish” on.

Digital Media Revenue

Now to the good stuff. As mentioned, BIA credits much of the growth in local advertising revenue in 2022 to digital advertising. Overall, BIA believes that digital media revenue will account for $85 billion (49.2%) of local advertising revenue in the U.S. this year. Digital ad types include:

• OTT/​CTV
• Digital TV
• Digital radio
• PC and/​or laptop
• Mobile (both smartphone and tablet)
• Email
• Digital newspaper
• Digital magazine
• Online directories

Which Digital Channels Should Your Client Use?

This may be a long list, but there are a few ad media types BIA suggests looking closely at. For example, OTT TV is projected to grow by 57.4% in 2022. That’s a bigger growth than what mobile ads will experience this year. The pandemic began a greater appreciation for streamed TV content among Americans that isn’t likely to fade any time soon.

When it comes to paid media, mobile and PC and/​or laptop ads are among the top local advertising channels. Mobile is currently estimated to bring in $35.7 billion and PC and/​or laptop ads’ revenue is estimated to be $32.1 billion. Keep in mind that the political vertical will buy plenty of digital advertising, roughly $1.9 billion.

To see which of these digital ad media types your client’s target customers are most likely to take action after seeing or hearing, check out their profile on AudienceSCAN on AdMall by SalesFuel.

Traditional Media Revenue

Now you may be thinking, “Wait, digital makes up less than half of expected local advertising revenue this year!” You read that correctly. Although digital media revenue is growing this year, it still hasn’t quite caught up to traditional media just yet.

In 2022, traditional media revenue will make up $88 billion (50.8%) of local advertising revenue in the U.S. Traditional media ad types include:

• Cable TV
• Over-​the-​Air TV
• Over-​the-​Air radio
• Direct mail
• Print newspaper
• Print magazine
• Directories (print)
• Out-​of-​home

Which Traditional Channels Should Your Client Use?

This is another long list. But luckily, BIA provided additional insight into some of the traditional local advertising channels, as well. Among paid media, direct mail is the second most lucrative channel. In 2022, it’s estimated to account for $33.4 billion of total advertising revenue. Additionally, local traditional TV is expected to grow by 28.4% this year. A lot of that growth will come from political ad buys. 

Specifically, the political sector will amount to $3.7 billion of TV OTA buys and $1.1 billion in cable TV buys. Local radio stations can expect about $418 million in political ad sales, while direct mail service providers can look forward to a $716 million ad boost. Competitive races in local markets for Congressional seats as well as issues votes will drive ad purchases.

Again, if you’d like to know which traditional media ad types your client’s target customers are most likely to respond to, check out their AudienceSCAN profiles.

Photo credit: Creative Christians