Photo by Tim Reckmann on Flickr.com
Known together as a “duopoly” in the advertising industry, Google and Meta are expected to receive less than 50% of all digital advertising revenue in the US this year for the first time since 2014.
The two giants who control the biggest user sides of the internet era, such as search engines and social media accounts, have been making enormous revenues for years.
The duo’s ad dominance has made both companies the target of antitrust investigations and lawsuits for years. While they are still rising higher than their digital rivals, their growth momentum is starting to slow as the competition progresses.
According to Insider Intelligence data, Google and Meta together accounted for 48.4% (for Google) of US digital ad revenue this year, up from their peak of 54.7% in 2017 (34.7% for Google and 20.0% for Meta). Google will have 28.8% of the market revenue, while Meta will have 19.6%.
THE BIGGEST THREAT IS AMAZON
In other words, half of the money spent on digital advertising for the last eight years went into the coffers of these two companies. As of this year, 48.4% is expected. The biggest threat to the monopolies of the two companies is Amazon, which is expected to generate $30 billion in revenue from advertising in 2022.
By 2024, Amazon is expected to receive 12.7% of all US digital advertising money and 17.9% of Meta.
While TikTok’s advertising business is booming, it’s still relatively small in the US compared to its big tech competitors.
TikTok is expected to generate $8.6 billion in ad revenue in 2024, making it the fifth-largest digital ad publisher in the US after Google, Meta, Amazon, and Microsoft/LinkedIn.
TARGET ADVERTISING MARKET
The ubiquity of screens at home, at work, and on the go has enabled virtually any company to target customers with digital ads. It has expanded from other publishers and social media companies to competitors for Google and Meta.
Along with other e-commerce players such as Amazon, Walmart, and eBay, it has begun building a substantial digital advertising network that can be used to feature products in its market.
While Google had long dominated digital search advertising, it also controlled meta-targeted social media advertising. However, new entrants to the advertising market are shaking the positions of these two companies.
More people are leveraging TikTok and Amazon to search for products and ideas online, which is taking some of the momentum away from Google’s dominance.
APPLE POLICIES HIT FACEBOOK
Changes to Apple’s app tracking policies have significantly reduced Meta’s ability to target ads based on a user’s activity across apps. Meta said it expects Apple’s changes to cost it $10 billion this year.
Both companies rely on the growth of digital video (YouTube for Google and Instagram for Meta) to stay competitive.
Aggressive lobbying against Big Tech’s advertising dominance, mostly by the digital news industry and smaller tech rivals, will make it harder for Google and Meta to expand their advertising businesses through acquisitions.
