Changing rules of engagement? What the data says

Many marketers are talking differently about what they believe to be the best way to communicate with customers.

This trend was something Marketing Week outlined in a piece kicking off a new series looking at why some brands are shifting how they engage with consumers, and what this means in terms of delivering advertising effectiveness.

Changing rules of engagement: Is effectiveness shifting?

Over the past year, a number of marketers have said they are increasing investment in communications designed to individually engage audiences, as opposed to mass reach media. That could be through using influencers, brand “experiences” (either in real life or online), or organic social media. All of which was outlined in the first article.

In this next piece, we have compiled data around the topic, to see if the trend plays out more broadly and brands’ advertising spend is shifting to different channels, plus where it is moving from. This article also looks at what audiences are present across different channels, as well as effectiveness data around each medium.

What are brands investing in?

When it comes to looking at whether the shape of spend is changing, it’s important to look at available data about where brands are investing.

Together, search and online display accounted for more than 80% of the UK’s total ad spend (43.1% and 38.7%, respectively), according to the latest quarterly data from AA/Warc. TV is the third most significant category, making up around 10% of the UK’s total ad spend.

Social media is counted as a subsection of the total online display ad spend category. When pulled out separately, it accounted for over 20% of the UK’s total ad spend in the second quarter of 2025.

While TV still maintains its place as the third biggest channel for ad spend by some margin when digital channels are grouped together, when looked at separately, ad spend on social media is now double that of TV.

The shift began to happen during the pandemic. The graph below shows that ‘total TV’ received a higher proportion of investment until Q2 2020 at which point social media began to rival it in terms of spend. While for a number of years the channels remained close in spend, the data suggests a divergence from Q4 2022 onwards, when social media began to take a clear lead.

While AA/Warc data provides detail on spend by channel, it does not provide look specifically at influencer spend.

Data from WPP Media, which forecasts global advertising revenue, predicted that creator-driven content will overtake traditionally produced content in terms of ad revenue this year. It forecasts that creator revenues will hit $185bn (£138bn) in revenue in 2025, and more than double to $377bn (£282bn) by 2030. This year more than half of content-driven advertising revenue will come from platforms like TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram Reels, according to the data.

In the most recent iteration of its report, WPP Media also forecasts strong growth for commerce media, which is set to account for 15.6% of global ad revenue in 2025, up 11.6% to reach $178.2bn (£133.5bn) and overtaking total TV ad revenue for the first time.

Social media is also expected to grow; with the channel’s share of total ad revenue globally expanding from 34.8% in 2024 to 36.1% in 2025 and 36.4% in 2026. However, the growth for social media companies’ ad revenue is expected to be slowed by factors including AI and age bans.

Meanwhile, the IPA’s Bellwether provides an indicator of the confidence brands feel in investing in advertising in the UK, as well as where they are investing. The IPA’s quarterly survey asks businesses whether they are increasing, cutting or keeping their spend the same across different channels. Those answers are then reflected in a net balance score; for example, if 50% of companies said they were cutting spend in a particular channel, and 30% said they were increasing, the net balance would be -20.

The data does not indicate how much businesses are investing in particular channels, and so it can be difficult to glean insight as to how much brands are investing. It can also be difficult to work out how much brands are shifting spend strategically versus reacting to the environment. The Bellwether tends to show scores correlating with the economic backdrop.

The latest Bellwether data for the third quarter of 2025, shows main media advertising budgets were flat, with a net balance of 0%. Within that, video (which includes TV, cinema and online) saw growth of 6.7%, while other online activity achieved a net balance of 2.1%.

Direct marketing was one of the main drivers of marketing budget growth, with 21.5% of companies increasing their direct marketing budgets in Q3, while 11.8% reported cuts, resulting in a net balance of 9.7% – up slightly from 9.1% in Q2. The figures highlight the continued resilience of the channel as brands seek measurable, targeted ways to engage customers.

Meanwhile, published brands, audio and out-of-home all saw cuts. Spending on published brands fell from -4.8% in Q2 to -6.2%, audio declined sharply from -6.3% to -13% and OOH registered the steepest fall, from -8.9% to -15.2%.

Interestingly, events, under which in real life brand “experiences” could fall under was the channel that the saw the most significant swing in the recent Bellwether, with a net balance of 10.9% of companies upwardly revising spend.

Creator marketing is harder to get spend data on. However, according to internal data from social media agency Billion Dollar Boy, its existing clients increased creator spend by 80% year-over-year between its 2024 and 2025 fiscal years.

Data suggests that digital channels like social, as well as creator content is garnering more investment from brands than before. However, just because there is increased investment does not necessarily mean these channels are the most effective.

Who are these channels reaching?

The data above suggests that investment in social channels is growing quickly, something which is being influenced by changing consumption patterns. This year, for the first time in its history, the IPA TouchPoints dataset showed that British adults (aged 15-plus) are spending more time on their mobile phones than in front of the TV set.

The data suggested a generational divide, with those aged 15 to 24 now spending almost five hours daily on their mobile phones and under two hours watching the TV set. Conversely, those aged 65 to 74 spend four hours 40 minutes watching the TV set and under two hours on their mobile phones.

While mobile may have overtaken TV in terms of viewing hours, there are clear differences in how audiences feel when consuming the different types of media.  The data reveals that British adults are 52% more likely to feel relaxed when watching the TV set compared to viewing video on a mobile phone. Conversely, viewers are 55% more likely to report feeling sad when watching video on a mobile phone versus on TV.

Mobile overtakes TV watching for the first time

While investment in social media channels shows no signs of stopping, research from the Financial Times by GWI, analysing the online habits of 250,000 adults in more than 50 countries found time spent on social media peaked in 2022 and has since gone into steady decline.

Figures from Ofcom suggest that watching video on demand and using social media are the media with the widest reach, with 85% and 84% of people using them each month, respectively. These were followed by listening to live radio on a radio set (68%), watching live TV on a TV set (67%) and listening to streamed music (62%).

What’s working?

Reach is not necessarily a sign of media effectiveness. A broad reach is little use if most people who come into contact with the ads on that channel are ignoring them.

This is demonstrated in ‘The Cost of Dull Media’ from Professor Karen Nelson-Field, with contributions by Adam Morgan and Peter Field, which finds that advertisers are losing an average of 43 cents for every dollar spent in “dull” media environments.

Dull media environments are defined as those unable to attract and hold attention. When brands talk about changing the way they engage with consumers, attention is often cited as a key driver. Some marketers will assert that consumers’ attention spans are diminishing, meaning brands must capture minds in new ways.

However, if investing in social media is presented as a solution to this problem with attention, then brands may need to think again, according to the data presented in The Cost of Dull Media. The report shows how ad spend is distributed across formats grouped by dullness level.

Commerce media to exceed global TV ad revenues in 2025, study suggests

It identifies what it terms as “non-premium” social media as the biggest driver of dull media, accounting for 72.8% of budget that is spent on “extremely dull” media. By contrast, linear and connected TV accounts for just 13.6% and 1.3% of “extremely dull” media spend, respectively.

This data suggests that advertisers are actually losing the most money on “dull” media channels through social media investment.

While increased investment in social is clearly a pattern among many marketers, as shown by the data laid out in the first section, research suggests that social media spend can lack the attention, as well as the longevity of other channels.

A report by Thinkbox and Tapestry measured how long an ad’s impact lasts after a campaign ends. It found that social media performed the worst on this metric. Social media ads saw decay in purchase intent of 26% over eight weeks, according to the research, compared to 14% on linear TV, which had the lowest rate of decay.

TV ‘most effective’ channel for sustaining purchase intent

Traditional social media advertising does not perform well on longevity. However, according to recent research from the IPA, influencer marketing can have “strong returns particularly over the long term”.

A study of 18 UK campaigns found the long-term ROI effect of influencer marketing was greater than that of paid social. According to the IPA data, influencer marketing has an ROI index of 151 compared to 77 for paid social. Influencer marketing also has the greatest long-term multiplier across all media channels at 3.35, compared to linear TV at 3.27, the study suggests.

While the IPA’s study provides strong econometric evidence about the effectiveness of influencer channels, it can be harder to measure the effects of creator work and access data relating to its effectiveness. Unlike traditional social media spend, platforms like Meta and TikTok don’t see what spend is being invested in creators, with that data often sitting with individuals.

There is much work to be done in this area, but given the differences in long-term effectiveness between paid social and influencer marketing that show up in the IPA study, it is important to not conflate the effectiveness of paid social and creator marketing.

Another effectiveness study in which paid social does not perform particularly well is in Profit Ability 2. The data was commissioned by Thinkbox but independently analysed, and uses collective data from Ebiquity, EssenceMediacom, Gain Theory, Mindshare and Wavemaker UK.

The study covered £1.8bn of media investment in the UK across 10 media channels, 141 brands and 14 categories, with the media channels involved including TV (linear and BVOD), generic PPC, paid social, audio, print, online video, out-of-home (OOH), online display and cinema.

The study analyses data from 2021, 2022 and 2023 to work out more about the post-Covid effectiveness landscape. It found that, in this period, TV accounts for 54.7% of the full advertising-generated profit, with an average full profit ROI of £5.61 for every pound spent. Within this, linear TV accounts for 46.6% of full payback, and BVOD accounts for 8.2%.

By comparison, paid social accounted for 9.4% of full payback, with an average ROI of £3.20.

What the numbers say

As well as analysing what marketers have said, it’s important to look at the figures, when looking at the potential of shifting norms of how brands engage with consumers and the impact that has on the effectiveness of their communications.

Looking at the data available, it suggests many advertisers intend to shift spend towards channels such as social. However, on examining the effectiveness data, it appears that, in general, traditional channels like TV continue to outperform social on long-term effects in particular.

However, much of what the quotes in the previous article refer to, is not a divergence of investment into paid social channels (although clearly this is happening according to the data), it was a shift from the mode by which they engage with consumers, from mass reach to a more one-to-one approach. While paid social advertising can be targeted closely in many instances, it can still be seen as a mass reach strategy.

Much of what was discussed in the previous piece, including brand “experiences” and organic social, is not captured in advertising data. Creator marketing does have some effectiveness data available; however, this remains fairly thin on the ground compared to more established channels like TV.

It’s important to apply nuance on this topic, and understand that the idea of creating communication that facilitates a conversation as opposed to talking at consumers is as much about execution as about channel.