Singapore, Thailand & Malaysia drive ad spend growth for SEA in 2022
Ad spends across APAC bounced back in 2022, driven by strong growth in Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia and a 64% leap in digital investments across the region.
South east Asian markets reported strong growth in advertising spend in 2022. / Image by Jason Goh from Pixabay
The data from Nielsen Ad Intel reinforces Thailand and Malaysia’s current status as emerging growth markets and a top focus for the region's brands and marketers.
Thailand’s ad spend grew 9.12% to reach US$3.6bn led by investments from multinational giants Unilever, Procter & Gamble and Nestle. TV and digital remained key channels for brands and outdoor and cinema also recorded significant growth.
It was a different story in Malaysia, where McDonald's, KFC, and Pizza Hut were the big spenders helping the market reach $1.5bn up 8.05% on the previous year. Malaysia’s dominant TV and newspaper channels remain key channels for investment, in addition to strong digital ad spends.
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E-commerce and retail continue to power Singapore’s ad market, where Lazada, Amazon, and NTUC FairPrice helped deliver a 10.17% boost to ad spend to total $1.6bn. Social media continues to dominate, followed by TV and outdoor.
Asia’s resurgence from the impacts of covid-19 was evident in the ad investments, as outdoor and cinema advertising grew 19% to reach $0.9bn and 131% to $0.3bn, respectively.
Unsurprisingly, digital ad spends saw the biggest growth, surging 64% to reach US$9.2bn; however, TV continues to retain the lion’s share of spend up 6% to $36.3bn. Radio dropped 8% to $4.1bn, while print was steady at $3.2bn.
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The results raise questions about the region's ongoing prosperity as it faces uncertainty from global economic uncertainty.
Aaron Rigby, managing director of advertisers at Nielsen Asia, says, “As the advertising environment becomes more complex, brands, agencies and media owners need the latest advertising intelligence to differentiate themselves from the competition and to carve out the best path forward for their brands and media.”