Are Businesses Increasing Ad Spending During COVID-19?

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the world in ways we’ve never seen before, it seems ecommerce has seen mostly positive effects. While people have stayed home for the last few months, online shopping has followed the trend of the last decade of replacing in-store shopping. We surveyed leaders across industries and asked them point-blank, “Are businesses increasing ad spending during COVID-19?” From a majority of respondents, the answer was a resounding yes. Businesses and digital marketers are increasing advertisement spending during COVID-19. We’ll break down which platforms they used to advertise on and which industries have stayed on top during this time.

Why Are Businesses Increasing Ad Spending?

Jeff Moriarty, Marketing Manager for Moriarty’s Gem Art, writes, “After seeing an increase in sales through our ecommerce store after the lock downs across the country, we saw an opportunity to go after new customers through paid advertising and social media. We increased our spend by 300% through Google Adwords and Facebook Ads.” 

Other businesses saw the drop in digital advertising costs too and took advantage of the dropoff in competition. Not only was the advertising cheaper, but, as Moriarty says, “The conversion rates we saw were double what they were before the lock downs.” 

What Platforms Are Being Used?

Isaac Hammelburger, Owner & Founder of Search Pros, writes, “With the increase in people staying at home and using their phones, social media advertising is the best way to go. There are a large number of platforms such as YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, these are some of the top social media apps in today’s society. They allow you to specify your specific demographics making it easier to reach out to your target market. Google ads are also available when you want to generate leads. With the use of online advertising, it is easier to reach a larger number of people compared to traditional paper advertising. Technology has made the whole world easier to reach, the problem is retaining people’s attention and making yourself stand out.”

Taking a similar route, Calloway Cook, President of Illuminate Labs, illustrates her business’s situation as such: “We significantly increased ad spend on Amazon Sponsored Campaigns. We identified through small-scale testing that this channel was the most profitable for our brand, and our increase in spend coincided with the COVID-19 epidemic.”

And Jesse Schoberg, Co-Founder and CEO of DropInBlog, emphasizes that it’s a good time to be in advertising with a product that helps online businesses. He writes, “We’ve increased our ad spend to our Shopify App and have been seeing great results. During the last few months we’ve seen about a 2x increase in signups and so we’re leaning into that with more ads. Click-through to install rates are also up about 40%. I’ve talked to other makers who have tools that help businesses with their online presence and heard similar stories.”

What Industries Are Flourishing? What Industries Are Suffering?

Digital marketing companies are impacted positively or negatively during this time, depending on their niche. While some companies are experiencing vastly reduced revenue and cancellations of work with clients, some industries are increasing their marketing budgets. 

This is especially the case for clients in the medical and healthcare industries who are reaching out to digital marketers to get advice on media outlets, social media, and correspondence with journalists. 

Jase Rodley, founder of Jase Rodley and Dialed Labs, discusses the companies’ strategy: “Targeting medical and healthcare niches we managed to gain enough business to more than compensate financially for our paused/cancelled clients.”

Are There Hidden Benefits to This Time? 

Businesses have suffered, prospered, or experienced a bit of both during this pandemic. For others, including Will Ward, CEO of Assistive Listening HQ, “COVID 19 has been a huge factor in us shaking up the whole business strategy.”

For Ward, understanding that customers were experiencing the uncertainty of the future, “Hope is what people need.” He writes, “We tailored the ad-copy and image to show that we care and things will eventually be alright. It worked because even folks who are not interested in buying now reached out to us showing support. So it turned out to be a great brand-building strategy as well apart from the new customers.”  

Are Businesses Increasing Ad Spending During COVID-19? The Bottom Line

In a world that is increasingly moving online, businesses are spending more on advertising to attract online consumers. Social media is at the heart of many of our interactions nowadays, and these platforms have proved to be of great use to businesses. 

For those businesses struggling during this difficult time, digital advertising can be an inexpensive and fruitful way to recover.