The latest numbers from the local arm of Standard Media Index (SMI) – which tracks advertising expenditure in the U.S., Europe, Western Asian and Asia-Pacific – showed that advertising spend in Canada officially reached, and surpassed, pre-pandemic levels.
CARD recently spoke with Kelly Fedoruk, senior manager, client solutions for SMI about the changes that have taken place over the past couple of months. The full Q & A is available here.
Some highlights from their discussion included:
- In Q1 2021, the market was flat relative to 2019. In Q3, the market is up 13% versus 2019.
- Digital advertising continues growing year-over-year. In Q4 2020, Canada crossed a 60% digital share. In Q3 2021, it’s sitting around 57%.
- Since Q3 2020, CPG has been outspending automotive. Clearly, this is attributable to pandemic-related buying.
- Wellness advertising has seen a huge uptick during the pandemic, particularly in the social and digital space.
