BIA Advisory Services has released its 2022 U.S. Local Advertising Forecast 2022, predicting that the overall local U.S. advertising market is expected to reach $161.5 billion – a 10.1 percent year-over-year growth. The report projects that for the first time mobile advertising spending will surpass direct mail as the top media advertising platform in 2022.
BIA also says that traditional media revenue will account for $84.6 billion and digital media will be close behind at $76.8. BIA also anticipates $7.5 billion of the sum will come from political advertising during a strong election season.
“For a long time, we’ve been talking about direct mail as the king of the share of wallet in local ad spending,” said Rick Ducey, Managing Director of BIA Advisory Services. “This coming year, for the first time, we pass the crown over to mobile, as its momentum drives it to be the biggest overall piece of the spending wallet – and we expect that to continue in the foreseeable future.”
Looking specifically at radio, the company sees sees a rise in local radio advertising revenue in 2022 and is expected to generate $12.7 billion split between over-the-air ($11.0 billion) and digital ($1.7 billion). By 2026 radio digital revenues are expected to reach $2.4 billion, while OTA goes up and down with the even political years and ends at $11.7 in 2026.
Mark Fratrik, SVP/Chief Economist at BIA, says, “Radio isn’t faring as well as local broadcast TV, and it doesn’t get the same bump as TV in political years. But it is getting close to its pre-pandemic levels as people continue to return to work commutes and traveling by car.”
“I like to refer to our data on local television as our ‘piano key graphs,’ because during even political years it is very apparent that the advertising revenue will rise and then dip the following year.”
