46% of global ads are sold by 5 companies

In 2010, the top five companies accounted for 17% of global advertising spending. However, a new report released by the British advertising agency WPP Group found that the top five companies in 2020, Google, Facebook, Alibaba, ByteDance and Amazon, accounted for 46% of the total advertising spending.

Of the $412 billion in worldwide advertising dollars paid in 2010, Google accounted for 7%, Viacom/CBS 3.2%, Newscorp/FoxNews 2.9%, Comcast 2.4%, Disney 1.7%, and other companies 83%.

Meanwhile, advertising expenditure in 2020 totaled $641 billion, and if you look at the breakdown, Google 21%, Facebook 14%, Alibaba 4.5%, TikTok ByteDance 4.4%, Amazon 3.2%, and other companies 54%. Of these, Google and Facebook both sold 19% of global advertising in 2016, but in 2020 they accounted for 35% of the total market revenue.

The WWP report also released the top 25 advertising revenues. According to this, it is outpacing existing media technology companies such as Fox, Comcast, and Verizon. In particular, ByteDance showed a remarkable growth rate by increasing its sales from $800 million in 2016 to $28 billion in 2020.

The WWP reports that in 2010 major global markets were lined with leading media owners, with Google being the only ad seller that was not a media owner, while others were primarily dominant in select markets in the United States, as well as some of the industry leaders at the time. As for advertising, he said the international influence was minimal. But now, the focus of advertising sellers is on China, and its presence is global. Google and Facebook are the first and second largest advertising companies in the world excluding China, while Amazon is emerging as the third largest advertising company in many countries. Related information can be found here.