74% of Global Marketers Expect to Increase Investment in Online Video in 2024

Online video is the channel most attracting global marketers as investment intention swings high – as many as 74% of advertisers expect to increase spend, while only 3% plan a decrease, according to WARC’s Marketer’s Toolkit 2024 survey data. 

Emerging channels – particularly those where younger audiences tend to gather – continue to gain traction: 60% of respondents plan to increase investment in podcasts, 48% in retail media, and 58% in online gaming.

Print, TV, and cinema are the channels where the highest percentage of global marketers expect investment to decrease in 2024. Negative sentiment towards print is especially noticeable among agencies, where two in three (66%) expect investment to decrease.

Ahead of major sporting events in 2024, one-third of marketers expressed an intention to boost investment in sponsorship and only 14% of global marketers plan a decrease – a 30 percentage point improvement from 2020. Meanwhile, 29% of marketers plan to increase investment in out-of-home ads.

Kantar research revealed that while in-person channels dominate consumers’ ad preferences, online video ads remain marketers’ favourite channels for a fourth year in a row.

Digital platform-wise, TikTok is most popular among global marketers: WARC Markter’s Toolkit data finds that 77% of respondents plan to increase ad investment on TikTok next year, followed by YouTube and Instagram.

Marketers expect to increase or maintain investment on all major digital platforms, apart from X – where 46% of respondents plan to cut spend.

Credit: WARC