Despite endless debates on the decline of television viewership, advertisers, especially those with political agendas, are not ready to write off TV yet, especially when it comes to news channels. According to media planners, TV news AdEx will see over 85 percent surge in the poll season, primarily driven by political campaigns.
According to TAM, between January and February alone, ad insertions of television grew 2.8 times compared to the same period last year.
“In 2019, the TV news AdEx from March to May amounted to Rs 1203 crore, out of which Rs 541 crore was attributed to political ad spends. For the 2024 poll season, TV news AdEx is expected to reach Rs 2259 crore, with Rs 885 crore dedicated to political ad spends,” said an insider who did not wish to be named.
The political ads spends on TV news indicate over 60 percent growth.
Experts suggested that the total advertising expenditure on election campaigns could be anywhere between Rs 2500-3000 crore in the 2019 general elections.
Of the above, ad spends on social media and other digital platforms was estimated to be around Rs 475 crore to 500 crore.
All of these numbers have gone up significantly. The total overall spends for this season was estimated to be around Rs13000 crore, however there is no confirmation on a definite figure.
The disclosed numbers on Meta and Google are higher than expenditures on the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. What is being spent in a month now was the total spend of almost one quarter back in 2019.
Between February 2019 and May 2019, Google and Facebook reported a combined political ad expenditure of approximately Rs 58 crore. Google disclosed 12,276 political ads amounting to Rs. 29.3 crore in four months, while Facebook’s India Ad Library declared a total of 132,419 ads valued at Rs 29.28 crore.
However, television is taking the lion’s share of close to 50 percent of the total ad spends and 50 percent of that is going to news channels across languages.
“The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been running the Phir Ek Baar Modi Sarkar campaigns aggressively while the Congress is promoting itself through the Ab hoga Nyay campaign which is also a reference to the Nyuntam Aay Yojana, the party’s minimum income guarantee promise, and its key poll-pitch,” said anther anonymous expert.
The big spending parties according to planners are not just BJP, and Congress but also AIADMK, TDP, Akali Dal, Telangana Rashtra Samithi.