There's a reason Instagram is always trying to make you buy something.
Digital advertising revenue is absolutely skyrocketing, hitting a total of over $100 billion in the US. last year, a report published Tuesday by the Interactive Advertising Bureau reveals. Social media advertising is still a big part of that, but it's not quite the juggernaut it used to be, CNBC notes from the study.
From its early days in 2012 until 2018, social media advertising revenue in America has grown a compounded 46.6 percent each year, the study notes. Yet it only grew 30.6 percent in 2018, possibly explaining "why companies like Facebook are exploring new ways to make money, like shopping ads on Instagram," CNBC says. Then again, such massive growth can't be sustained forever.
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Mobile, video, and digital audio are among the formats also on the ad revenue upswing. Mobile ad revenue first passed desktop totals in 2016, and grew a massive 40 percent from 2017 to 2018, AdAge notes from the study. Video went up 37 percent between the two years, while digital audio grew 23 percent, largely thanks to the podcast surge, the IAB says. Yet with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) proposing a big tech breakup as part of her 2020 presidential platform, there's a chance that digital ads, which rely on user data and often blur the lines between content provider and advertiser, could suffer.
Read more advertising takeaways at CNBC, or find the whole study here.
