Five tech giants grab 52% global advertising budgets

Report emphasises dominance of Big Tech, though newer players like Bytedance are getting in on the game

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More than half of the world’s advertising budgets (51.9%) will be spent at Alibaba, Alphabet, Amazon, Bytedance and Meta by 2024. For the first time, that sum will exceed $1,000 billion.

Between 70-80% of online budgets in the West already end up with Google and Facebook. But those who take a somewhat broader perspective and look at all available advertising dollars will see that tech platforms worldwide handle every other dollar.

This is revealed in the new report The Future of Media 2024 by UK media and marketing company WARC.

Globally, advertising spending is expected to grow 10.7%.

A characteristic of Alibaba, Alphabet, Amazon, Bytedance and Meta is, none of them is a publisher or media company in the traditional sense. They are mainly e-commerce parties and social or profile platforms. They each have their own advertising platform. Euros going there have no chance of ever reaching a news publisher or media company.

WARC signalled that AI technology is adulated in these spheres but easily turns into a smokescreen. “This raises critical questions about media quality and the future of advertising on the open Internet,” its report stated.

By the former, the researchers mean the algorithms that determine where which commercial will appear. There is no human control over context, the underlying advertising systems are closed, becoming digital ‘black boxes’.

The second issue, ‘the open Internet,’ is about the question of accessibility. Facebook and Instagram, for example, are in parts as closed as an oyster. Without an account, the platform cannot be used. An open Internet provides cover against this tactic, allowing for ‘guest’ checkouts meaning users need not hand over personally identifiable information to ad trackers.

On the medium of television, the researchers said advertising spending on linear television fell 5.4% in 2023. Only 18% of marketers said they expect to spend more in 2024. Furthermore 39% said they will scale back spending there. In fact, TV viewing time declined 2.7%, according to the researchers.

Notable in the WARC figures is the rise of Amazon and Bytedance. The rise of these parties has already caused Facebook and Google to lose their dominant position there in the advertising market.

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