BIA Advisory Services’ newly published 2024 US Local Advertising Forecast anticipates a robust year for local advertising, with projected total revenues hitting $175.6 billion. This surge of 8.6% over 2023 is largely attributed to the political season. However, when political spending is excluded, the total local advertising forecast is a more modest $164.6 billion, representing a 2.2% year-over-year increase.
The data comes ahead of BIA VP of Forecasting & Analysis Nicole Ovadia’s appearance at Forecast 2024 on November 15. Ovadia will open the day with a discussion about broadcast revenue trends and expectations for 2024.
The forecast also offers insights into the distribution of ad revenues between traditional and digital platforms. Traditional media will account for 52% of the total ad spend at $91.5 billion, while digital media will hold a 48% share, amounting to $84.1 billion. This comes as major players like Meta and Alphabet have reduced their advertising revenue expectations, causing BIA to revise its digital ad spending projections.
In terms of growth channels for 2024, unfortunately, radio is outside the top five of CTV/OTT (+39.5%), TV OTA (+30.0%), TV Digital (+24.3%), Cable TV (+19.7%), and Out-of-Home (+9.4%). This marks a fairly significant change from what BIA forecasted for 2023, with the top three paid media channels for 2023 including direct mail ($37.2B), mobile ($33.5B), and PC/Laptop ($29.0B).
The fastest-growing categories year-over-year are political advertising (+2028.3%), special restaurants, food & beverage stores (+17.2%), and realtors (+16.7%). On the flip side, sectors such as veterinary services (-15.8%), online gambling (-15.3%), and funeral homes & services (-14.4%) are expected to see a decline in year-over-year advertising spend.
Ovadia stated, “As expected, 2024 will be driven by political spending, and, even in markets that are not highly contested there will be a large amount of political advertising. Local political advertising will be fueled by the Presidential and Senate campaigns as well as issue-based advertising. When we look at the forecast without political, we expect only a slight increase in ad spending due to both global and local economic trends that may create more cautious spending.”
She added, “Digital isn’t growing as fast as it once was. Meta, Alphabet, and others lowered their advertising revenue expectations several times throughout 2023, which in turn has caused us to reflect these reductions in the digital ad spend we track across 96 business categories.”
Finally, Ovadia noted, “When you look at which media will grow from this year to 2024, local political advertising is the main driver, which is terrific for local sellers of these channels. Beyond political, several other verticals will increase next year. One category to keep an eye on is Realtors looking to advertise to drum up demand. Declining verticals include those that experienced growth during the pandemic, like veterinary services, that have now waned. Also worth noting is that many states legalized online gambling this year so we expect this sector to reduce its local ad spending and move towards National/Network advertising going forward.”
The full 2024 US Local Advertising Forecast is available on the group’s website.
