Brands to spend £3.3bn on social media ads this year

The Facebook data row and ongoing concerns over accountability and measurement are unlikely to halt the march of social media advertising, according to the latest figures, which show that a quarter of all UK digital ad spend will go to social networks this year.
According to eMarketer, brands in the UK will spend £3.3bn ($4.2bn) on social network advertising, a 24% increase over 2017.
eMarketer has actually increased its projections for social networking ad spend by almost 5 percentage points since the previous forecast, due to diversification in the marketplace which it insists is driving up overall social network user rates and resulting in increased spend.
Facebook continues to dominate the social media landscape, but the likes of Instagram and Snapchat are still making inroads, especially with younger audiences.
With the exception of TV, social network’s share of ad spend has now overtaken all traditional media formats in the UK. But come 2020, even TV will be reeled in, with social network ad spending accounting for a fifth of all media ad spend and broadcast TV, at just 17.8%, according to the report.
eMarketer’s UK senior analyst Bill Fisher said: “While Facebook has been losing teen users, Snapchat has been adding them. The result is a growing social media market, and one that advertisers are keen to utilise. Media-rich targeting options, with video a particularly big play, make platforms like Snapchat and Instagram especially attractive.”