Agency diversity, online ad fraud and an ad recession: 5 killer stats to start your week

We arm marketers with all the important numbers they need in order to tackle the week ahead.

1. No deal Brexit could lead to UK ad market recession

A ‘no-deal’ Brexit could lead to a recession in the UK ad market, with press and TV advertising particularly hard hit.

Enders Analysis is forecasting a 3% recession in a no-deal Brexit. While that is an improvement on the recession seen in 2009, when total ad spend plunged 13% during the financial crisis, it shows the negative impact it could have on the UK ad industry.

By comparison, if Britain manages an “orderly withdrawal” from the EU then the ad market would see 2.7% growth.

Under the no-deal scenario, it is forecast that ‘total display’, which includes TV, radio, cinema, press, outdoor and pure play online, would see revenues decline by 5.3%. Within that, TV would fall by 9.3%, press by 12%, out-of-home by 5.1%, radio by 6.5% and cinema by 3.3%, leaving just pure play online in growth of 3.1%.

Under the orderly withdrawal scenario, TV, press and radio would still fall but by lesser amounts while outdoor, cinema and online would see growth.

Source: Enders Analysis

2. Diversity figures improve for ad land

The number of women working at C-suite level in UK ad agencies climbed from from 31.2% in 2017 to 32.7% in 2018, although that is down from 2015’s record high of 33.1%.

At creative agencies women now occupy 32.8% of C-suite roles, up from 30.5% in 2017. Meanwhile, at media agencies there has been a slight increase in female representation at board level, from 32.2% in 2017 to 32.7% last year.

Across agencies, ethnic diversity is at its highest recorded level with 13.8% of individuals from a black, Asian or minority ethnic (BAME) background, up from 12.9% in 2017. At creative agencies 12.4% of employees are from BAME backgrounds, compared with 10.7% the year prior, and at media agencies this figure stands at 15.2%, up from 15.0% in 2017.

The proportion of BAME individuals at C-suite level has increased from 4.7% in 2017 to 5.5%.

Source: IPA

3. Marketers might be using the wrong metrics to judge content campaigns

Despite the fact marketers are likely using content-driven campaigns for brand engagement, they aren’t using engagement metrics as their primary KPIs.

Almost half 49% of respondents to a survey (climbing to 60% of advertisers) believe ‘brand engagement’ is content’s key strength. Brand engagement ranks significantly higher than ‘changing perceptions’ at 28% and ‘building awareness’ at 17%.

But ‘increased brand awareness’ is the main KPI being used (cited by 26% of respondents), followed by measuring changes in brand perception (25%).

The first engagement-related metric comes in third with ‘time spent with content’ listed as the main KPI by 20% of respondents.

Source: World Media Group

4. New standards help reduce digital ad fraud

Online ad fraud is dramatically reduced when advertisers use publishers that are signed up to the industry’s Trusthworthy Accountability Group (TAG) standards. On average, digital ad fraud rates are 8.99%, but on TAG-certified distribution channels this drops to 0.53%, a decline of 94%.

For the study, TAG analysed digital ad fraud rates in some of Europe’s biggest markets including the UK, Germany, France, Italy and The Netherlands, by comparing invalid traffic rates in TAG-certified channels against industry norms by measuring ad impressions between January to August 2018.

A similar study by TAG in 2017 found ad fraud declined by 83% for ad channels that met TAG standards.

Source: TAG

5. Marketers reveal what their ideal job looks like

Marketing professionals are looking for a London-based job, in a company with less than 50 people that pays more than £51,000 a year.

Some 33.3% of marketers desire a salary of more than £51,000, while 27.8% would be happy with annual pay of £25,500. Another 66.7% would prefer to work flexi-time – meaning they can work eight hours of their choice so long as it falls between 6am and 8pm.

Meanwhile, just 22.2% want to stick with the traditional 9am to 5pm and a further 44.4% would like 30 days holiday, compared to 38.9% who would be happy with 25 days.

The majority of marketers would also prefer to work for a smaller company, with 38.9% agreeing that they’d like to work with a business of less than 50 employees, compared to 11.1% who wish to work for a startup and 27.8% for a medium-sized business.

Source: CV-Library

 

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