Barb has again shared an advertising tier estimate for Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon. The number of UK homes on the Netflix ad tier continues to build, reaching 3.8m (13.1%) up from 2.78m (9.5%) in Q2. The Disney+ ad tier averaged 1.2m (4.1%) up from 820k homes in Q2. A different approach to moving homes to its ad tier means 86% of homes with Amazon Prime Video access in Q3 are on the ad tier – 11.5m homes (39.3%).

Doug Whelpdale, Head of Insight at Barb said: “After strong growth in Q1 and Q2 it was perhaps inevitable that the growth in homes accessing subscription VOD services would slow. The overall number of homes accessing at least one SVOD service remained above 20m, but the number with more than two services dipped to below 14m homes. Suggesting viewers continue to remain wary of economic turbulence.

This stability in overall subscriber numbers further demonstrates why services are exploring other avenues to continue revenue growth. While Amazon is likely to be the biggest ad tier for some time, it’s interesting to see the growth of the Netflix ad tier towards 4m homes and Disney+ past 1m homes. With darker evenings and the festive season on the horizon the number of ad tier homes for Netflix and Disney seems likely to grow.”

Barb’s viewing data shows how new titles and library programming combine to drive time spent with these streaming services.

Streaming services with a household penetration of more than 5% are reported. Caution should be applied when comparing Barb’s sample-based numbers to audited numbers published by the SVOD services. Respondent recall of access to these services is subject to some uncertainty – this could occur where the respondent is not the subscriber in the household, or the service is provided in a package with other services.

Source: Barb

D&AD, the globally renowned non-profit which represents the pinnacle of creative excellence, has released its highly sought after Annual available for free as part of its ongoing commitment to nurturing creativity across different communities.

The organisation is sharing full access to the D&AD Annual – a summary of the insights, strategies and campaigns that powered the best creative work at the D&AD Awards 2024 – and the D&AD Trend Report which explores the themes from the Annual and how they might shape the future.

The D&AD Annual goes ‘behind the work’ of this year’s award-winning creative campaigns across 32 categories and provides exclusive insider insights from the people who brought them to life. Judged by over 300 world-leading designers, advertising executives and skilled creatives, the D&AD Awards represent one of the annual high points of the creative calendar with all winners presented with a prestigious D&AD Pencil.

From how conspiracy theory tactics were co-opted to make skincare brand CeraVe go viral, to how Channel 4 worked with multiple directors to portray vignettes of British life and Apple found inspiration in the transparency of glass to inform the design of their Vision OS, the D&AD Annual shines a light on all the 2024 shortlisted and winning work.

As part of the Annual, D&AD Voices also invites perspectives on major themes represented in the winning work; from the lucrative rise of women’s football penned by journalist and broadcaster Zing Tsjeng and an exploration of how to brand a cultural institution by Art Review’s Louise Benson, to unpacking the new generation of magazines with MagCulture, and climate advertising with Creatives for Climate. The D&AD Annual is available online here: D&AD Annual 2024. With thanks to D&AD’s creative partners Studio Dumbar responsible for the Annual design.

Supporting this is the 2024 D&AD Trend Report. With hundreds of the world’s leading designers, advertising experts and creatives casting their eye over a record number of over 12,000 entries from 78 countries, the report, created with The Thought Partnership, examines the stand-out themes from this year’s D&AD Pencil winners. It distills the catalogue of insights gathered from the jury rooms, as well as the impact of wider cultural and societal shifts in the world at large.

This year’s report identifies six major trends for creatives to embrace – Fandoms: Nurturing the Niche, The Human Toolkit, Localised Impact, Elevating the Everyday, Type Against Homogeny and Textural Evolution. The full D&AD Trend Report is available online here.

Dara Lynch, D&AD CEO says “Right at the heart of our mission to nurture creativity is our ambition to empower and mentor emerging talent, and this is absolutely why we make our sought-after D&AD Annual and D&AD Trend Report available online for free. We want to inform and inspire the next generation of creatives – we know they have incredible potential, and we believe that the insights provided by the D&AD Annual and the D&AD Trend Report can act as a catalyst to unlock this potential across communities and categories. We are proud to celebrate creativity today and every day because, ultimately, creativity can power competitive advantage for businesses of all sizes and sectors.

“Regardless of background, training or circumstance, D&AD is here to support creatives from every corner of the world navigate their career. Our archive, learning programmes, masterclasses, and, most importantly, generous community of established and emerging talent are here to help the next generation realise their creative ambitions.”

Source: D&AD

LG Ad Solutions, in collaboration with MediaScience, today released a groundbreaking study that underscores the effectiveness of creating a seamless Connected TV (CTV) advertising experience. The study, titled The Connect Effect, demonstrates that integrating CTV Video, Native, and Mobile Video ads within a single campaign boosts key brand metrics and performance.

The study revealed that brands incorporating a full TV experience – spanning CTV Video, Native ads, and Mobile Video – into their campaigns saw significant improvements in performance. Brand awareness increased by 4.7 times, ad recall surged by 8.7 times, and brand consideration grew by 11.2 times, all while reducing cost per visit by 23%.

“Since 2014, Smart TV adoption in the UK has surged to 74%, transforming how viewers, advertisers, and content publishers interact beyond traditional TV. To fully capitalise on CTV environments, brands must look beyond the 30-second spot and focus on the complete TV viewing experience.“ said Ed Wale, VP Europe of LG Ad Solutions. “Appearing on the first screen people see, offers a unique chance to capture consumers’ attention at the very first moment of engagement, setting the tone for the entire viewing experience and making a lasting impact where first impressions matter most.”

The Smart TV home screen is becoming a more important factor in the path to content. On average, people access more than seven different content sources on their Smart TVs, and 42% of viewing starts without a specific plan in mind, making the Smart TV home screen a crucial gateway for engaging consumers. LG Smart TV users will visit the home screen three times per day on average. MediaScience’s eye-tracking phase of the study revealed that:

• LG Smart TV users stay on the LG Smart TV Home Screen for 33 seconds on average. 
• 85% of viewers looked at the Native ad for an average of 7 seconds or 14% of their total screen time. 
• Viewers looked at the Native ad +132% longer if there was a video component and +46% longer if there was a QR code.

Although linear TV still commands two-thirds of ad spend, its longer ad breaks and lack of frequency control have diminished its effectiveness compared to newer platforms. The study found that including linear TV in a campaign mix negatively impacted ad perception across almost all tested attributes.

The total TV experience doesn’t stop with the Smart TV ecosystem. Ninety-three percent of viewers use other devices while watching TV, with 71% holding their phones throughout their viewing. Advertisers can enhance engagement by creating connected experiences that span multiple screens.

CTV campaigns that combine Native and Mobile Video components achieved a significant lift in brand recall—over 60 percentage points—while also being perceived as less intrusive. Brands already using CTV Video strategies can increase brand recognition by more than 10 percentage points and ad recall by over 13 percentage points by incorporating CTV, Native and Mobile Video formats.

Although mobile ads received less visual attention than those on TV, the study found that brand recall remained comparable across CTV Video and Linear TV.

Source: MediaScience

A new study has revealed that one in three US teens under the age of 18 have been approached by a brand to sponsor a product through their social media or know someone who has.

Additionally, over 1 in 5 (23%) US teens under the legal working age of 16 have been approached by brands for sponsorship opportunities.

The study found that nearly half a million (486,101) US teens earned $1,000 or more in brand-sponsored social media earnings in 2024.

To explore the scale of teen earnings through digital channels in the US, Whop, the all-in-one platform for digital products, gathered survey data from US teenagers aged between 12-18 years old to produce the US teen digital earnings report 2024. The findings show that teenagers in the US are capitalizing on their digital presence and turning screen time into serious income.

Findings show that nearly 1 in 3 (31%) US teens believe brand sponsorships through social media are realistic methods of making money online.

A further 28% of teens believe product review videos are a realistic way of making money online. Over 1 in 5 (22%) teens believe viewer earnings from social media are a good money-making method.

How much are students making in brand-sponsored social media posts?

Two in five (42%) teenagers in the US are actively earning money online, an average of $717.62 was made by teens through online activity in the last year. Meanwhile, just 38% of 16-19 year olds were in employment or searching for a job in May 2024¹.

Those in the youngest age bracket below the legal working age, at 12-15 years old, earn $560.99 on average every year online. While those of legal working age (16-18 years old) earn $908.94 in an average year.

The data shows that there are entrepreneurial teenagers going even further than this. Approximately one student in every high school, around 40,000 US teenagers², earns $10,000 or more each year via their digital channels.

Operating online has given teenagers a platform to leapfrog the traditional roles to become their own boss, highlighting a whole digital economy that US teenagers are at the forefront of.

Cameron Zoub, CGO and co-founder of Whop, says:

“The way people make a living is changing — Gen Alpha and Gen Z’s entrepreneurial mindset alone is proof of that. They aren’t mindlessly scrolling as some would have you believe. They’re building their networks, meaningfully engaging with brands, and creating their own path to financial freedom.”

“Our findings are clear: younger generations are hungry for opportunities to make money online. It’s a sign of the times, and what more is to come.”

Source: Whop

Industry pioneer in intelligent app linking, URLgenius, and impact.com, the world’s leading partnership management platform, joined forces to unveil key insights from their latest Commerce Creator Lightning Survey¹. The findings spotlight new opportunities for Brand Marketers to align with Commerce Creators and thrive amidst the evolving consumer holiday shopping behaviour and challenges of a nervous economy.

“In this climate, Commerce Creators have a direct impact on audience buying decisions and brand loyalty, as shoppers become more selective with their spending,” said Brian Klais, CEO & founder of URLgenius. “While 51% of creators have begun their holiday campaigns, brands still have time to refine partnerships and position themselves for success in 2025.”

Key insights from the Commerce Creator Lightning Survey include:

Fierce Competition:

• 45% of creators say rising competition for audience attention is their top challenge this holiday season 
• The pressure to produce fresh content (25%) and to maintain a work-life balance (23%) were also notable challenges.

Compensation Balancing Act:

• 47% of brands prefer flat-fee with performance bonuses, with nearly half of creators citing rate negotiation as their biggest challenge in working with brands.
• The silver lining? Pay-per-post plus commission emerged as the top compensation model across all follower counts, offering a win-win by sharing both risk and reward.

Unease of the Unknown:

• Both parties rely on measurement to illustrate success, but are concerned with it being outside their control.  For brands, sales figures and engagement metrics ranked first and second respectively when assessing the success of an influencer marketing campaign with 41% citing difficulty in measuring campaign effectiveness as a common challenge.
• For creators, 64% marked shifts in social media algorithms changing as their top concern in the next year, impacting their income and business. 

Creative Differences:

• While over half of brands surveyed value strong creative control, 35% of creators prefer complete creative freedom to keep content authentic for their audience. Both sides must balance brand safety with a creator’s authenticity to foster trust. 
• 40% of brands surveyed prioritized brand fit when selecting creator partners. Marketers must look beyond follower counts to build lasting partnerships, which both Creators and Brands ranked as the most effective collaboration.

“September is not over and we’re already seeing half of creators actively share holiday content, indicating that brands should be engaging with influencers now, to leverage a cost-effective and ROI-driven channel that aligns with how today’s buyer makes purchases,” said Cristy Garcia, impact.com Chief Marketing Officer. “We’ve seen when brands and creators come together to create and share authentic content, including trusted reviews and recommendations today’s shoppers seek out before making a purchase, they can build stronger connections with consumers and ultimately drive conversions.”

Click here for additional insights and data from URLgenius & impact.com Creator Commerce Lightning Survey.

¹About Commerce Creator Lightning Survey Data: URLgenius & impact.com Commerce Creator Lightning Survey was conducted from August 15, 2024 – September 4, 2024, across 143 brands and 148 URLgenius client creators. Brand Respondents: 66% of brand respondents surveyed stated they oversee both their affiliate and influencer marketing teams with nearly 50% having their influencer and/or affiliate marketing programs for at least three years and 60% stating it is very important to their marketing mix. Client Creator Respondents: 51% of respondents’ follower count is between 100K-500K with 74% identifying it as a career.  Nearly all creator respondents selected affiliate commissions as their primary source of income, while ad revenue (36%) and selling their own products & services jumped dramatically YoY.

Source: URLgenius

“The study, titled “Why CTV Reigns Supreme in the Attention Economy: Part 2,” is a follow-up to ShowHeroes’ acclaimed 2022 research and offers fresh insights into CTV’s dominance in the TV space. With 1,000 participants surveyed across six key European markets – Germany, the UK, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain – the research combines detailed surveys and cutting-edge eye-tracking technology to explore how viewers engage with CTV advertisements.

“CTV advertising is a rapidly expanding market that demands constant innovation. Innovation demands understanding,” says Sarah Lewis, Global Director CTV at ShowHeroes Group. “Our new study shines a stronger light than ever on user attitudes and behavior to help all of us in the industry deliver CTV advertising people want to see and respond to.”

The research was divided into two key parts: in the first, users across all six aforementioned markets were surveyed to understand their attitudes and viewing behavior toward CTV and CTV advertisements. In the second, the same respondents were asked to watch a video and had their behavior recorded by eye-tracking software.

The study uncovered valuable findings, including the fact that enhanced CTV ads with on-screen animations are popular with viewers, and CTV was the most popular OTT screen among respondents.

“CTV usage and advertising are growing fast, which is why learning more about this medium is so relevant,” said Stefan Bliekendaal, Head of Data Tech & Insights at KINESSO. “We were excited when ShowHeroes asked us to come on board for this essential follow-up research and I’m sure the findings will be valuable for the whole industry.”

“CTV is a leading topic in digital advertising for a reason: it’s popular and extremely effective. We’re proud to be at the forefront of CTV research and innovation,” said Ilhan Zengin, CEO at ShowHeroes Group. “Our 2022 study was ambitious and set a bold precedent, pushing the boundaries of what we understood about CTV, and hugely rewarding for us and much of the industry. Since then, CTV has not just grown, it has transformed, making it essential to revisit and deepen our insights. This latest research not only reaffirms our commitment to leading in CTV innovation but also paves the way for the next wave of advancements, both within ShowHeroes and across the entire industry.”

Source: ShowHeroes Group

Today, VIOOH, the leading premium global digital out of home (DOOH) supply-side platform, released its annual research into the programmatic DOOH (prDOOH) market. The findings show that the UK is a well-established prDOOH market, with programmatic accounting for almost a third (29%) of campaigns in the past 18 months. This is the highest growth rate globally, tied with the US and France, and surpasses the global average of 27%. In the UK, adoption is set to increase to 36% in the next 18 months. The UK has a high proportion of advertisers (29%) who have previously used prDOOH and are starting to embrace programmatic as their standard buying approach for DOOH, confirming its status as an established market for prDOOH.

Surging demand for prDOOH reshaping budget allocations

Investment in prDOOH in the UK is set to grow by a third (29%) in spending over the next 18 months. The UK growth is expected to be fuelled by new budget allocation according to a quarter of respondents (24%), a 9 percentage points (ppt) year-over-year (YoY) increase. UK marketers are also moving budget towards prDOOH from digital channels (82% including DOOH, +6 ppt YoY) in-line with the global average (83%), a trend which is slightly more pronounced for advertisers (85%) compared to agencies (80%).

Growing preference for an automated and data-driven approach to DOOH

Programmatic-only buys have seen a substantial YoY increase, accounting for 47% of DOOH campaigns in the past 12 months (+18 ppt YoY).

DOOH campaigns have also typically been bought using a combination of programmatic and direct buys (38%) and direct-only buys (45%). The increase in programmatic-only campaigns indicates a growing preference for this automated and data-driven approach to DOOH advertising in the UK.

Most UK respondents (90%, +9 ppt YoY) agree that prDOOH offers the most innovative advertising opportunities of all media channels, surpassing social media (83%) and display (81%), although prDOOH is most typically bought alongside social media for both brand (83%) and performance (83%) led campaigns.

UK marketers value prDOOH’s ability to deliver high-quality viewability (61% compared to 58% globally). This likely stems from the top-tier placement of digital screens in busy areas and the clear visibility offered by digital displays. 

While OOH specialist media agencies remain a key resource for planning and buying prDOOH, utilised by 78% of marketers (+27 ppt YoY), the role of demand-side platforms (DSPs) has grown substantially, with 43% of marketers leveraging DSP managed services for prDOOH, a notable 30 ppt increase YoY. This aligns with a broader global trend towards greater DSP adoption, as prDOOH is increasingly planned, bought and activated within multi-channel campaigns.

Dynamic Creative Optimisation (DCO) is gaining significant traction in the UK, with 96% of marketers considering, piloting, or actively integrating it into their prDOOH campaigns.

Recognising the dual benefits of prDOOH for both brand building and performance marketing, UK marketers prioritise performance-based metrics when assessing campaign effectiveness. The top three metrics used to evaluate prDOOH campaigns include sales uplift (53%), impact on website traffic (44%), and increased performance when integrated with other digital channels (42%).

Sustainability & prDOOH

Sustainability is a major consideration for UK advertisers when planning and buying media, with 59% ranking it among their top five factors (compared to 52% globally). Marketers in the UK particularly favour prDOOH for its efficiency and sustainability credentials, recognising its eco-efficient reach as prDOOH is only activated when a relevant audience is present or predefined trigger criteria are met (61% prDOOH vs. 55% DOOH vs. 49% OOH).

“In the UK, awareness of the advantages of prDOOH is widespread, and recognition of its future potential continues to grow. This is driven by a strong emphasis on audience-centric strategies, performance-based metrics, budget shifts and a growing role of DSPs in planning and buying prDOOH. As the advertising landscape evolves and advertisers are increasingly aligning their campaigns across channels, we expect prDOOH’s ability to deliver targeted, measurable and eco-friendly campaigns to solidify its position as a key player in the UK’s media landscape,” said Jean-Christophe Conti, Chief Executive Officer at VIOOH.

See the full report here: viooh.com/sotn

Source: VIOOH

The Next Gen Influence report – available to download on We Are Social’s website – sets out five trends defining a new era of brand and creator collaboration. It describes what’s driving them and the implications for brands, featuring examples from the likes of Booking.com, H&M, and more.

Within each trend, the agency has identified a cohort of fast-growing creators that represent the next generation of influence. These range from Kahlil Greene, a Gen Z Historian on TikTok who uses his platform to rewrite our understandings of history, to John Pork, an AI enhanced Travel Influencer who happens to be a pig.

The Next Gen Influence trends are: 

The Right to Reinvention: Social loves a ‘journey’, but in today’s creator economy, this focus on the journey has complicated our idea of authenticity. Authenticity used to require consistency, but today – with child influencers growing up, and mainstays ageing out – audiences used to watching people change. In this context, creators are planning their evolutions to draw in new viewers. 

Featured creator: Julie Vu, the first transgender houseguest on Big Brother Canada, is masterful for her glamour and her humour. But she’s really won the love of audiences for making content that narrativises and visualises ‘the journey’ of her trans evolution, as much as the destination. 

Relatable Realism: Aspirational content is the bread and butter of influence. But today – with most people striving for stability, not luxury – aspiration is having to change shape to stay realistic. Now, creators peddling ‘the good life’ are having to reappraise what that life looks like to make it feel relevant for real people. This means lifestyle content that’s less about glamour and luxury, and more about calm and stability.

Featured creator: @hart_of_shetland – a former city-dweller now making ethical crafts on the Shetland Islands – shows off her enviable vistas and close-knit neighbourhood. But lifestyle content feels real and achievable to non-capital city audiences, offering alternative perspectives to urban-dominated social.

Influential Allies: In recent years we’ve seen creators engage in acts of altruism to demonstrate their ethical credentials – a trend embodied by Mr. Beast’s loud charitable endeavours. But in this context, there’s increasing concern that philanthropy is being used for the purpose of online clout. As audiences become sceptical of moral posturing, creators are swapping work that claims values for work that actively disrupts or challenges the status quo. 

Featured creator: Kahlil Greene, a Gen Z historian on TikTok, uses his platform to resurface and challenge obscure or forgotten historical truths – whether that’s Mexico’s having its first Black president 200 years before the US had Obama, or the Black history of cowboys. He encourages viewers to wield this knowledge to spur real change, like showing the precedent for reparations.

Credible Creativity: On today’s social channels, a new wave of culturally impactful creativity is thriving, driven forward by creators who’ve mastered ‘very online’ modes of communicating. These approaches – from making work inspired by fanfic to repackaging vulnerability as entertainment – are pushing the creative bar higher for everyone, but especially for brands, who have to be as entertaining as their human counterparts, but without the same licence for imperfection or human charm attributed to real people. 

Featured creator: Subversive undertones are everywhere on social. While brands themselves might get side-eye for poking fun at topics like addiction, partnerships with playfully risqué creators – like Marc Jacobs’ work with @sylvaniandrama – gives brands more licence to participate in irreverent, ‘very online’ humour.

Extreme Influence: The ‘dead internet theory’ is one of many laments of how bots, trend cycles, and garbage content have thrust online creativity into crisis. For today’s creators – who find themselves wading through a sea of content that’s loud and fast-moving, but often lacking in creative merit – it’s difficult to stand out. As the next generation of creators navigate this space, they’re leaning into the unusual and extreme, trying to break the internet’s unspoken rules to make an impact. 

Featured creator: To combat this sea of sameness, creators like Max Webb are pushing the broad space of sports content to its furthest extreme, with lo-fi, high-octane adventure content showcasing elaborate feats of human achievement. 

To identify the trends, We Are Social conducted a mixed-methodological approach to analysing influence, using quantitative, qualitative, and cultural analysis. Through contextual desk research, expert interviews, and using influencer identification platform Tagger to identify recent fastest-growth creators, its Cultural Insights department used thematic analysis to identify five emergent trends shaping the influencer marketing category.

Mobbie Nazir, global chief strategy officer at We Are Social commented: “The ‘creator economy’ is a force of industry, but it ladders up directly from the work, whims, and playfulness of individuals. The same grassroots energy that makes it so vibrant and pliable is what makes it quick to change, and harder to keep a handle on.

“One glance at the content made by today’s creators – its tone, topics, and production norms – shows a culture that’s changed dramatically in the decade since influence’s infancy. Next Gen Influence examines today’s creator economy not for its surface level shifts, but for the deeper motivations that’ll impact brand-creator collaboration in the long term.”

Download the full report now. We Are Social will be presenting the report at the DMexco conference in Cologne, Germany on (18th September).

Source: We Are Social

The report also reveals that environmental concerns are increasingly becoming an important factor in Christmas shopping for many people, with 85% planning to take environmentally friendly actions this Christmas. These include reducing food waste, shopping more locally, reducing gift wrapping and packaging, avoiding novelty presents and choosing gifts that will last. This may also indicate why one area of spending is likely to see a decrease this year, as UK consumers expect to spend less on Christmas decorations.

According to the research, people in the UK are expecting to spend more on the festive feast, with Christmas dinner, drinks and nibbles all seeing an uptick. But while positivity is high, the findings show that people are still looking for value for money and quality in their Christmas shop.

The 2024 Festive Insights report reveals that the number one thing that would make UK consumers’ lives easier when shopping for Christmas is knowledge of the best available prices (46%). This is closely followed by free delivery (41%) with more than a third of consumers (34%) looking for a little inspiration to make their lives easier.

Sarah Tsirkas, Retail Industry Director at Teads UK, comments: “This new mood of consumer optimism is great news for brands. However, our report reveals that value for money remains a top priority for festive shoppers this year. As always, strategic planning of festive ad campaigns — both in messaging and timing — is paramount.”

In a further nod to this positive mood, the gifts under the tree are likely to be a little more plentiful this year. While spending on presents is likely to rise across the board, spending on presents for children is expected to rise even more significantly than on those for partners and friends. 

Speaking of gift timelines, the survey highlights that there’s a significant spike in shopping for tech gifts around Black Friday and Cyber Monday, other gift shopping follows a slightly different pattern. Toys and homeware purchases see a steady upturn from October through until Christmas, whereas food and drink gifts are planned to be bought in December.

This suggests that food and drink gifts aren’t just last-minute options, but that UK consumers are consciously waiting for Christmas grocery offers to buy, while spreading costs over a longer period for non-consumables.

To unwrap more festive gifting trends in 2024, download the 2024 Festive Insights report.

Source: Teads

Kantar, the world’s leading marketing insights and analytics company, has found that marketer confidence in X (formerly known as Twitter) declined significantly in the past year, driven by brand safety concerns and poor perceptions around innovation and trust. The findings are included in Kantar’s Media Reactions 2024 report, an annual study exploring the evolving media landscape. The study, based on interviews with c.18,000 consumers in 27 markets and 1,000 senior marketers globally, also reports that YouTube remains the ad platform marketers most prefer, while, for consumers, Amazon and TikTok share the top spot.

The fall of X: a shift in confidence

Kantar’s findings reveal that a net 26% of marketers have reported plans to reduce ad spend on X in 2025, the biggest recorded pullback from any major global ad platform. Marketers’ trust in adverts on X, historically low, has decreased further under Elon Musk’s leadership, from 22% in 2022 to 12% in 2024. Only 4% of marketers think adverts on X provide brand safety (in contrast to Google, which comes top for brand safety at 39%). X scores outside of the global top ten for trust and for the perception of how innovative advertising on the platform is. This contrasts with TikTok, the most innovative advertising publisher for the fifth consecutive year, and YouTube, the most trusted.

Gonca Bubani, Global Thought Leadership Director – Media at Kantar, comments: “Advertisers have been moving their marketing spend away from X for several years. The stark acceleration of this trend in the past 12 months means a turnaround currently seems unlikely. Marketers are brand custodians and need to trust the platforms they use. X has changed so much in recent years and can be unpredictable from one day to the next – it’s difficult to feel confident about your brand safety in that environment. Ironically, decreasing spend by marketers on X will make consumers happier with the platform as they come face to face with fewer ads.”

Top-ranking digital media brands, by preference (brackets denote change in ranking)

This year Amazon and TikTok are a first-place tie for consumer preference. Kantar’s research has found that Amazon ads are perceived as being more relevant and useful, whereas TikTok ads are perceived as more fun. However, neither brand features in the top five ranking among marketers. Netflix, measured by Kantar as an ad platform for the first time this year, achieves a top five position among both consumers and marketers, helped by its top-three position for brand safety among marketers. YouTube has solidified its position as the top choice for marketers.

Point-of-sale ads become consumer favourites

Kantar’s 2024 analysis shows that point-of-sale (PoS) ads hold the top spot, replacing sponsored events in terms of consumer preference. PoS ads are seen as particularly trustworthy and useful and don’t hold negative connotations such as being intrusive. Other favoured channels include cinema ads, sponsored events, newspaper ads and out-of-home advertising.

Top-ranking media channels by preference, brackets denote change in ranking

Other key findings

Kantar’s Media Reactions 2024 survey offers a comprehensive view of the evolving attitudes of marketers and consumers in response to the changing media landscape:

• Mixed attitudes towards GenAI: 62% of consumers and 68% of marketers are positive about GenAI more broadly, but the same feeling doesn’t yet extend to AI-generated advertising. While most marketers (71%) are not bothered by AI-generated ads consumers are not so sure yet: two in five (41%) say AI-generated ads bother them.

• Good news for advertisers as consumer receptivity grows: Ad receptivity among consumers has been growing for the past decade as marketers find the sweet spot for nascent formats through trial and error and consumers are normalised to seeing ads on more channels. Almost half of consumers (47%) are now receptive to adverts, up from only 24% in 2020. The increase of 9 percentage points on last year (38%) is the highest change since 2020.

• Generational stereotypes are a myth: The brands most preferred by consumers vary significantly and there are some surprises: Gen Z prefers ads on Amazon, Facebook and Google, and among millennials and Gen X, Snapchat comes out on top. Older generations also welcome ads on TikTok, which appears in the top three among both Gen X and boomers.

Gonca Bubani concludes: “Campaigns which reach more receptive audiences are seven times more impactful. That’s why it’s so important for marketers to find the sweet spot between the right channel, the right media brand and the right format. To thrive in today’s fragmented environment, brands have to do more than understand shifting cultural and media dynamics – they need to care about their creative quality and make sure they’re customising it for the right environment. That means finding opportunities to stand out meaningfully, meet consumers in their diversity, and connect with audiences in more authentic and impactful ways.”

Source: Kantar