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Media, Entertainment Ads To Pass $6 Billion

With streaming media starting to take a major hold in the entertainment market — and television still playing its part — spending for digital ads on the medium are set to reach an all-time high, according to eMarketer.

The site reports that both the media and entertainment industries will see tremendous growth through year’s end, leading to an even higher number by 2019. The report, titled “The U.S. Media and Entertainment Industries 2015: Digital Ad Spending Forecast and Trends,” points out that the two industries will spend $6.19 billion for this year alone, up 18.8 percent from the previous year. Broken down separately, media will make up 5.8 percent of total U.S. digital ad spending, while the entertainment industry will account for 4.8 percent of the total.

What’s more, the numbers are expected to grow in double-digits over the next few years, leading into 2019. However, even with these high numbers, both media and entertainment still account for the lower end of digital ad spending overall, with only health care and pharmaceuticals below them.

When it comes to the focus of digital ad spending, entertainment seems to focus more on branding (accounting for 60 percent of spending overall), while media works more towards direct response (with 55 percent). Entertainment-wise, films and video gaming seem to get the most dollars, with some getting promotion even months before their release. For example, Activision released a trailer for Call of Duty: Black Ops III last month, well before the game’s November release date. One of this summer’s biggest films, San Andreas, also got a major digital push before its release today.

Meanwhile, advertising across mobile devices will make up for 53.5 percent of overall digital ad spending in the entertainment industry. Advertising for desktop and laptop devices will be close behind at 46.5 percent. Media brands will also devote its focus to digital advertising spending on mobile, by 51 percent.

“Media and entertainment industries have been pretty aggressive with mobile,” said Chad Gallagher, director of mobile for AOL. “They’re realized that consumers are on mobile devices more and more, especially at home.”

On the other side of the spectrum, programmatic advertising has been slow compared to digital ad growth. An estimated $780 million will be spent by entertainment industry marketers, or 41 percent of their overall digital display advertising budget. Meanwhile, media brands are likely to spend less than that, around $620 million, or 38 percent of its overall budget.

More details on the report can be found here.