SMI figures show ad market down 2.8 per cent in September
Standard Media Index numbers showed the market was down 2.8 per cent in September with a spend of $699m due to the lack of an AFL grandfinal in the month.
In TV spend the medium was down 1.6 per cent to $348m with Seven recording a 40.3 per cent share (down 3.4 per cent), Nine had 37.5 per cent (down 0.2 per cent) and Ten had 22.2 per cent (up 3.6 per cent).
The worst performing media were newspapers and magazines which saw media spend fall 22.1 per cent and 29.7 per cent respectively to $53.4m and $20.6m respectively.
The October announcement from SMI:
Australia’s media agency market looks set to deliver September bookings equal to last year’s record level – despite the inclusion of one of the biggest TV events of the year – with each of the Digital, Outdoor and Radio media already reporting record advertising expenditure.
Before late Digital bookings are included, total Agency spend for September is so far 2.7% down on the same month a year ago at $699.0 million but once those bookings are added the market will be flat. And that result has been achieved despite the AFL Grand Final broadcast this year in October, while last September also featured an extra Monday which meant an extra issue of all weekly Magazine titles and may see more week-commencing campaigns included in the prior year numbers.
Despite the absence of the AFL Grand Final, total Television bookings are down only 1.6% from last year’s record September, while Outdoor is so far delivering the only double digit gains (+11.4%) although Radio (+5.5%) and Digital are already at a record levels before late bookings, up 0.2%.
This month the highest growth Categories have been Gambling (+37.9%), with most of the extra spend going to TV, Food/Produce Dairy (+15.7% to emerge as the third largest of all categories for the first time) and Media (+39.9%).
And this month SMI’s Entertainment/Leisure-related Categories have been modified with SMI’s Agency partners agreeing to split it into the following sectors: Movies/Cinema/Theme Parks, Live Entertainment and In Home Entertainment. Also, Product Sub-Category data has also become available for the first time for Digital media and is exclusive to SMI. A full list of Sub-Categories is shown on pp11 and 12 of this report.
