Ad spend tops $9bn, but June slump highlights market fragility

Australia’s media agency bookings hit a record $9 billion in advertising spend for the 2024/25 financial year, with calendar year spend for the first six months of 2025 up 2.4%. New data from Guideline SMI shows that without the usual mid-year spike from government and political party campaigns, underlying ad demand rose 1.6% year-on-year.

In the past year, digital media spend surged 6.5%, led by a 20.8% lift in digital video.

June, however, delivered a post-election slump. Total media agency bookings fell 7.1% year-on-year, dragged down by a 34% fall in government ad spend and a 21% drop in food, produce and dairy advertisers.

Among key media sectors, video and streaming sites continued to grow in June, up 12.3%, while bookings to newspaper and magazines jumped 23% for the month, mirroring a trend also seen in the New Zealand market.

Digital video continued to rise in June, up +15%, but television fell 16.1%, with radio down 14.6%. Outdoor remained resilient with 5.3% jump, while cinema posted 12.6% growth for the month.

Digital and outdoor hit highs

Guideline SMI APAC managing director Jane Ractliffe said the results reflect the growing value of agency media services, with total campaign investment booked through agencies rising 31.4% over the past decade - representing an extra $2.15 billion in spend.

“Media agencies clearly continue to deliver valuable media advice and services to their brand clients,” Ractliffe said.

“But we’ve also arguably seen the biggest change in media habits over that time, with agencies literally doubling their investment in both the Digital and Outdoor media over those ten years. However, the number of individual media on which they bought campaigns reduced from 7,400 in FY2014/15 to 6,000 in 2024/25.”

For the financial year, digital claimed a record 46.4% share of total ad spend, while outdoor also hit a new high of 16%. Cinema spend grew 3.9% in the first half of 2025, though remains just shy of its 2018 peak.