Online advertising expenditure in Australia has seen a significant uptick, reaching $3.732 billion for the September 2023 quarter, according to the latest IAB Australia Online Advertising Expenditure Report prepared by PwC. This represents a 7.8% increase year on year and a 2.1% increase over the preceding quarter.

The report breaks down the expenditure by category, with Search and directories leading at $1.630 billion, followed by general display at $1.451 billion, and classifieds at $649.2 million. Classified advertising recorded an 11.3% increase over the June 2023 quarter and a slight 0.8% increase on the September 2022 quarter.

General display advertising saw a 2.7% increase over the June 2023 quarter and an 8% year-on-year increase from the September 2022 quarter. However, Search and directories experienced a slight decrease of 1.6% from June 2023 but showed a robust 10.6% year-on-year increase from September 2022.

In terms of specific formats, audio advertising expenditure remained stagnant over the June quarter but saw a 16.2% year-on-year increase from September 2022. Video advertising, on the other hand, recorded a 5% growth quarter-on-quarter and a 15% growth year-on-year from September 2022.

The report also highlighted strong growth in the retail, automotive, and health & beauty sectors. Retail reached a 17.1% share of general display advertising, automotive increased to 15.4%, and health and beauty reached 7.9%. Finance (8.7%) and FMCG (5.7%) also remained in the top five industry categories for expenditure.

Gai Le Roy, CEO of IAB Australia, commented on the findings: 'It is encouraging to see marketers continue to invest in advertising to drive growth. However, investment in different media environments was not universal and the market was tough for many organisations. Retail continues to be the number one advertiser category with investment from local and global retailers. It is also pleasing to see the uplift in automotive advertising with share of spend in the general display category above 15% for the first time since September 2020.'

The report also noted a shift in content publisher’s video inventory investment, with Connected TV increasing its share from 45% in the June quarter to 54% in the September quarter. Meanwhile, Desktop reduced from 38% to 25% in the same period, while mobile investment increased from 17% to 21%.