Tag: WARC

New outlook shows Gulf Crisis still threatens $94bn of incremental ad investment worldwide over next 18 months

Stuart Mitchell

A new study from WARC, the experts in marketing effectiveness, has found that a prolonged conflict in the Gulf region could threaten $39.6bn of global advertising growth this year, and $93.7bn over the next 18 months.   James McDonald, Director of Data, Intelligence & Forecasting, WARC, and author of the research, says: “As the Gulf Crisis stretches into its fourth month, global markets are now in damage limitation mode as the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz acts like a tax on consumers, lifting prices and squeezing real spending power.   “If…

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Eight major blockers prevent CMOs from closing the gap between brand and performance advertising to drive greater impact

Stuart Mitchell

There is a “say-do gap” in advertising: most marketers know the theory of effectiveness, but struggle to apply it. WARC and a coalition of effectiveness experts have identified eight major blockers for marketers to overcome as they seek to close this gap.   Spanning cultural, procedural and structural misalignments, these barriers undermine effective advertising by preventing marketers from implementing evidence-based principles, such as those demonstrated in the landmark study The Multiplier Effect, released last year.  From a disconnect between the CMO and the C-Suite on the role of brand-building, CEO and…

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Meta to earn $240bn from advertising in 2026 outpacing global social media ad growth

Stuart Mitchell

In recent years, Meta has transformed its proposition to advertisers through AI-driven automation, leading its advertising business to grow a forecasted 22.3% to $240bn this year, according to WARC Media. Serving ads across its mass reach ‘family of apps’ remains the foundation of its monetisation strategy. Its fast-growing ad business funds an aggressive AI innovation programme – which, in turn, fuels the flywheel through further increases in ad revenue.   WARC Media’s latest Platform Insights report explores Meta’s hyper-efficient advertising business, evaluates usage across its apps, and assesses the performance of campaigns on Meta.   Alex Brownsell, Head of Content, WARC Media, and co-author of the report, said: “Meta’s flywheel is spinning faster than ever. The…

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WARC releases The Future of Measurement 2026, exploring emerging trends in media and creative measurement

Stuart Mitchell

As marketing measurement continues to evolve, WARC, the global authority on marketing effectiveness, has today released The Future of Measurement 2026, a report that explores the latest emerging trends in media and creative measurement. It focuses on three key areas: the shift to outcomes measurement; how AI is moving measurement upstream; and the rise of creative intelligence.  Paul Stringer, Managing Editor Research and Insights, WARC, says: “Marketing measurement is no longer just about understanding what happened, but enabling better decisions about what to do next.  Traditional approaches – based on attribution, proxy metrics, and post-hoc reporting – are becoming less relevant.…

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Meta defies gravity, open web is moribund versus Q1 2026 benchmarks

Stuart Mitchell

The first quarter of 2026 delivered a useful reminder that not all online advertising growth is created equal. Meta outpaced WARC Media’s forecast, while Amazon held steady, and YouTube continued to struggle even as Alphabet’s wider advertising machine powered ahead.  This is according to analysis by WARC Media in its latest Earning Debrief, an advertising revenue performance analysis of Big Tech compared against WARC Media’s quarterly global ad spend forecast data, to provide a current round-up of their ad spend.  Benchmarking against WARC Media’s ad spend projections – derived from a proprietary neural network of over two million data points – Meta’s reported…

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