A new forecast by WARC Media puts retail media ad spend at a healthy year-over-year growth rate when examining 2023 dollars to 2024 forecasts.
The data also show that retail media, primarily used to drive sales, is moving beyond paid search formats into video, audio and out-of-home through cross-channel partnerships.
According to WARC Media, retail media ad spend will come in at $128.2 billion for 2023 and grow to $141.7 billion in 2024.
“The rise of Retail Media in the advertising landscape has been speedy,” WARC notes.
The biggest winner is Amazon. According to WARC, the “GAFAN” giant’s ad revenue is forecast to reach $52.7 billion in 2024. The result? Amazon is set to supplant Chinese goliath Alibaba as the world’s largest retail media owner by ad revenue this year. Between the two digital giants, an estimated $80 billion in advertising revenue was earned in 2022 — equivalent to 68.3% of global retail media investment.
“Retail Media has been the advertising story of the decade so far,” notes Alex Brownsell, WARC Media’s Head of Content. “The unfashionable and often informal world of trade and shopper marketing has transformed into a digital advertising behemoth. What comes next will be less spectacular but more significant to brands, as deterministic retail media data begins to inform campaigns across the media landscape.”
Just how huge is Amazon? WARC says it occupies an astounding 87.8% of the market outside of China and is predicted to earn $45.4 billion in ad revenue this yea. “Its 20.4% year-on-year ad revenue should see Amazon supplant Alibaba as the world’s largest retail media owner this year,” WARC notes.
As shown above, linear TV in 2024 on a global basis will end three consecutive years of ad spend declines. Still, search and social media continue to grow significantly, as is retail media.
Retail media networks are increasingly moving beyond search formats, however, and WARC sees activity stretching into video, audio and out-of-home through cross-channel partnerships that include a Roku-Walmart pact and a Kroger arrangement with Pandora. “This enables the unlocking of upper-funnel ad dollars with brand-building formats to improve campaign effectiveness,” WARC says.
Mudit Jaju, Global Commerce Media Lead at Publicis Groupe, commented, “To me, the most exciting thing happening is that retail media is no longer limited as this end-of-the-funnel conversion channel.”
