Australian businesses spend billions online. Every year, more.
If you're wondering whether digital advertising is worth it, look at where Australian businesses are already putting their money. These figures come from independent industry reports, mainly IAB Australia's Internet Advertising Revenue Report prepared by PwC. They are market-wide figures, not Sepher results.
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Spend has grown every year, and search is the biggest slice.
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Source: IAB Australia Internet Advertising Revenue Report (formerly OAER), prepared by PwC Australia. Calendar years 2022 to 2025, plus the financial year to June 2026. Select a bar for details.
Record quarters, back to back.
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Source: IAB Australia quarterly Internet Advertising Revenue Reports, December 2024 to March 2026.
Search leads. Video is growing fastest.
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Source: IAB Australia Internet Advertising Revenue Report, calendar year 2025. Formats as reported by IAB Australia.
Sydney is the most contested Google Ads market in the country.
Click prices are set by auction, so a higher price means more businesses are bidding for the same customers. In Sydney, the competition is already there. The question is whether your business shows up next to it.
Source: Digital Nomads HQ Australian Click Price Index, median Google Ads cost per click across 8,400+ Australian service keywords, year to May 2026. Converted from USD at 1.4337.
Trades pay real money for every click.
Industry estimates published by Australian marketing agencies, 2025 to 2026. Not official statistics; actual prices vary by suburb, keyword and season.
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Every one of those clicks is someone actively searching for what you do. Whether they become customers depends on the targeting, the landing page and how quickly you follow up. That's the part we manage.
Illustrative arithmetic only: budget divided by cost per click. Not a forecast of leads or sales.
Online now takes about three in every four ad dollars.
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Source: WPP Media, This Year Next Year report, as reported by Mediaweek. Pure-play internet advertising share of total ad revenue; 2030 is a forecast.
Money is moving from print to screens.
Retail media, meaning ads sold by retailers such as supermarkets and marketplaces on their own sites and apps, is the fastest-growing channel and is forecast to overtake total TV ad revenue in 2027. Newspaper advertising fell by more than a sixth in a single year.
Source: WPP Media, This Year Next Year report, as reported by Mediaweek. Year-on-year change in ad revenue, 2025.
Almost six hours a day online.
Source: DataReportal Digital 2026 Australia and Meltwater, start of 2026. Platform times are averages among each platform’s users.
A record $82.6 billion spent online in 2025.
Even businesses that never sell online are affected. Customers who buy this often online expect to find, compare and contact a business on their phone in minutes.
Source: Australia Post eCommerce Report 2026, based on CommBank iQ transaction data.
Brands that spend above their share tend to grow.
Les Binet and Peter Field analysed the IPA Databank, close to 1,000 advertising effectiveness case studies spanning three decades. They found that when a brand’s share of voice, its share of category advertising, is higher than its share of market, it tends to grow. The difference is called excess share of voice, or ESOV.
As a rule of thumb, every 10 points of ESOV went with about 0.5 points of market share growth a year. A Nielsen analysis of 123 brands, published with the IPA, landed on a similar figure.
From the same research: the most effective campaigns overall gave roughly 60% of budget to long-term brand building and 40% to short-term sales activation. The right split varies by category and stage of business.
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Illustrative only. The 10:0.5 ratio is an average from studies of mostly larger brands, and the effect varies by category. It is not a forecast for any business.
Sources: Binet & Field, IPA Databank research including The Long and the Short of It (2013) and Effectiveness in Context (2018); Nielsen and IPA, 2009.
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