Marketers shifting budgets: Holiday travelers and online gamers become top priority

Feb 28, 2019 | Online advertising

Households without children are no longer a top target for EMEA marketers, instead focusing budgets on reaching gamers and holiday planners, according to new research.

New data from data management platform Lotame looks at what prepackaged data audience segments EMEA marketers purchased from January to October 2018 compared to the previous year.

The findings are based on spend across the Lotame Data Exchange (LDX) – a data exchange for advertisers, representing what the industry as a whole is buying.

The top-five categories accounting for 62% of the total spend in EMEA include Entertainment, Travel, Home & Family, Advanced Demographics, and Style, Fashion & Clothing.

Entertainment

Entertainment led the way for EMEA spending in 2018 coming in at 15%. The entertainment segments that saw the highest revenue growth in 2018 include Online Games at 333% and Skiing at 321%. Football also saw an increased growth in revenue coming in at 102%.

However, some areas of entertainment didn’t seem as worthwhile to marketers. Many entertainment segments in 2018 went down including Gambling at 72% and Movies at 61%. General spending towards sports, as a whole, went down 45%.

“With online gaming receiving so much mainstream attention in 2018, it doesn’t come as much of a surprise to see a such a huge jump in spending,” said Alison Harding, VP Data Solutions, EMEA at Lotame. “Marketers saw huge opportunities to reach the online community in new and interesting ways, which will likely continue as the market continues to expand and attract new people.”

Travel

Travel came in next at 14% of EMEA spending in 2018 with a big jump in Holiday Travel at 388%. Following next was Winter Holiday Travel at 190% and Discount Travel at 171%. Some segments, though, saw decreases in 2018, such as Domestic Travel dropping by 70%. Additionally, Cruise Travel targeting dropped 53% and Summer Travel fell by 38%.

“It’s interesting to see the drop in Summer Travel as Europeans have shown little to no change in their travel habits, according to data from Statista,” said Harding. “The sizeable drop in Domestic Travel and the immense rise in Holiday Travel goes to show how marketers have a firm grasp on EU residents like to travel, allowing them to target with more relevancy.”

Home & Family

Making up 13% of 2018 EMEA spend, Home & Family saw segments targeting Animal Lovers go up 398% and a 135% jump in Green Living. Targeting towards College/University Students also saw an increase of 35%, while overall School & Education targeting dropped 29%. Additionally, spending towards Home Improvement went down by 26%.

“Living a green life continues to be a popular choice amongst consumers and businesses continue to follow suit to meet physical and ethical needs,” said Harding. “These statistics show marketers are taking notice of consumers’ lifestyle choices and preferences in order to build a meaningful rapport with them.”

Advanced Demographics

Making up 10% of EMEA spend, Advanced Demographics also saw a jump in 2018 segmenting. Looking more in-depth, segments targeting Households without Children and Parents of Teenagers dropped 89% and 71%, respectively, while segments targeting Parents of Young Children rose by 10%.

Advanced Demographics also saw Language jump by 257% and a rise in Social Class ABC1 (upper middle class) by 42%. In addition to the decrease in Households without Children and Parents of Teenagers, Declared Parents also dropped 81%.

Style, Fashion & Clothing

Style, Fashion & Clothing also accounted for 10% of total EMEA spend with Jewelry and Fashion Accessories leading the way with a massive increase of 461%. Following behind were increases in Online Shopping and Style & Fashion Lovers by 93% and 58%, respectively.

Many areas of Style, Fashion & Clothing didn’t resonate for marketers in 2018, though. Cosmetics dropped by a whopping 83% with Shoppers Children’s Clothing not far behind at 70%.
Source: Lotame

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