Commentary

Social Media Ad Spending Growing Steadily

Social media advertising spending will continue increasing at a steady pace over the next few years, according to a new forecast from eMarketer, which includes figures for per capita spending and also breaks down global spending by region.

Over the last few years social media ad spending per social network user has increased at the pace of around $7 per year in North America, and that will continue through 2015, eMarketer predicts. The research outfit calculates that social media spending per user grew from $19.03 in 2012 to $26.05 in 2013, and will reach $32.82 in 2014, then $39.89 in 2015. In percentage terms that’s a 37% increase in 2013, 26% in 2014, and 21.5% in 2015.

North America is the clear leader in social media ad spending, according to eMarketer: in fact the 2014 figure is more than double the next region, Western Europe, where spending will reach just $13.71 in 2014, up from $12.04 in 2013.  

Meanwhile advertisers will also reach more people via social media in North America, boosting the overall growth rate even further: eMarketer predicts that total social media ad spending will increase 30.7% in 2014 and 25.4% in 2015 -- about 4% above the per capita growth rate for both years.

Some regions will enjoy faster percentage growth rates, reflecting their smaller initial base: the Middle East and Africa will grow 63.9% in 2014 and 52.4% in 2015, according to the same forecast, while Latin America will grow 37.6% in 2014, slowing to 23.4% in 2015.

In December Forrester released a separate report showing that 52% of U.S. marketers plan to increase their digital ad spending in 2014, while 63% said they plan to decrease spending on traditional advertising in order to fund digital advertising.

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