BIA Updates Political Ad Spend Forecast

BIA Advisory Service has updated their estimates for 2020 political advertising spend from $6.55B to $6.58B.

In 2020, linear TV will get the largest share of political ad dollars in local with TV OTA (i.e., over-the-air TV) $3.07 billion in forecast spending. Nearly another billion ($915.4 million) will be spent on Cable TV. Digital accounts for $1.42 billion of 2020 political ad spending with search and display getting the lion’s share.

Newer entrants like Michael Bloomberg and Tom Steyer have spent hundreds of millions of dollars (and growing) in local markets. With the upcoming Iowa caucuses, candidates and super PACs are spending heavily for visibility.

Nationally, BIA is forecasting an average political spend per person in 2020 of $18.64. The top 10 largest television markets do slightly better than the national average at $18.81. But there’s a great deal of discrepancy in spend per person in the top 10 markets. Philadelphia, PA (#4) is forecast to receive political ad spend of $31.39 per person, while New York, NY (the largest market by population and the second-largest by total advertising spend) is forecast to receive political spend of $10.73 per person.

The highest per capita spending will be in battleground states in 2020. Markets in Maine, Nevada, and Arizona will receive the highest spend per capita, with over $47 in spending per person.

With a Senate race that is expected to be hotly contested, two markets in Maine, Portland-Auburn (#78) and Bangor (#155), are at the top of the list with the highest spend per pop, both nearing $50 per capita with $49.47 and $48.64 respectively. Maine’s third-largest market, Presque Isle (#205), just missed the list in 6th place.

“In some of the smaller markets, one thing to keep an eye on is how the huge volume of political advertising could crowd out other local advertisers during primary and general election seasons. That may have an impact on advertisers and media companies, and we’ll certainly factor that into our forecasting as we go through the fall,” said Dr. Mark Fratrik, BIA’s Chief Economist. While other traditional media like radio and newspaper won’t see as much of a direct boost from political as OTA TV and cable, sellers should approach TV and cable advertisers displaced by political ads to drive them to their platforms.