Auto, Insurance Advertisers Rise in First Part of 2019

RADIO ONLINE | Thursday, August 15, 2019 | 12:39pm CT

Media Monitors

There's definitely a car theme running through the latest advertiser rankings in radio, TV and cable. Just past the halfway mark of 2019, the top advertising categories are all related to driving: automotive dealers, insurance providers and fast casual-quick service restaurants. Home Depot, GEICO, Liberty Mutual and McDonald's aired the most spots thus far.

Local auto dealers revved up the number of radio spots they aired in the first several months of the year, finishing far ahead of any other category during the same period, according to Media Monitors' latest rankings of the top advertisers of 2019. The analysis covers the period from January 1, 2019, through July 31.

June's overall retail sales rise of 0.4% was driven by a 0.7% increase in auto sales, according to the Commerce Department. Car sales had a similar gain in May. To get their brand in front of interested consumers, insurance providers are right behind auto dealers in the number of spots they've aired this year. Local car and truck dealers led the way in the number of instances, focusing their advertising on both radio, where they broadcast the highest number of spots (7,659,729), and on TV, where they ranked 10th for instances (2,537,737).

At the same time, the insurance provider category ranked in the top three for each medium. Collectively, the advertisers aired most of their spots on cable (8,369,687), where the category ranked second. As a whole, they were number two in radio (5,280,802) and number three in TV (4,428,241).

The fast casual-quick service restaurant category ranked first among cable advertisers. The total number of spots for the segment was nearly 10 million. That achievement was accomplished by 156 advertisers. By comparison, the number two category was insurance, which aired 8,369,687 spots from nearly twice as many advertisers - 299.