Standard Media Index (SMI) tracking found that September was the fourth month in 2022 to witness an ad spending dip (3%) compared to last year. Overall, Q3 also experienced a decline (6%) from 2021.

“As reported by many North American media companies, their Q3 was hit by a weakening ad economy resulting from the fact that advertiser demand has been down,” tells MiC, Darrick Li, managing director for Canada at SMI.

“This is because of all the talk of economic uncertainty and the head winds of a recession. Advertisers are likely holding on to their dollars a little bit more tightly than they would have in the past, and are waiting to see how things play out.”

Advertisers want to know where the world is heading economically before they invest once more, explains Li.

The news, however, is not all bad.

“We see in our data that this ad spend dip was strongest in July and August of 2022, while September shows signs that we are coming out of that,” adds Li. “It’s important to recognize that we are still strong and in single digits. If we look at spend versus pre-pandemic levels, we are still up. In addition, 2021 was a particularly strong year of advertising in Canada, and we are still relatively flat in comparison.”

In terms of sectors, both digital and linear TV were down, although the first experienced less of a dip than the latter (1% and 6% respectively).

Li attributes this to some of the ad spending dollars from linear TV now shifting to digital. Unfortunately, this was not enough to bring digital into positive figures.

Overall, considering total cross-media spend per industry, most categories were down, but a few did manage to avoid that fate. Financial services saw a rise of 1%.

“There are no supply chain issues in the financial industry, so the sector is a little bit more immune to economic uncertainty,” explains Li. 

Another category that also exhibited growth was quick-service restaurants. QSRs grew their investment in digital and TV by 15% and 7%, respectively, in the quarter.