As early as summer 2022, forecasters began muting their ad spend growth projections for 2023. Now, as we shake the dust off last year, the outlook isn’t much different: Budgets will grow in the next 12 months, albeit at a slower pace than anticipated.

Against a backdrop of economic and geopolitical crises, rising inflation, supply chain disruption and technological shifts, marketing intelligence company WARC has wiped $90 billion off its original 2023 ad spend forecast, predicting budgets will now grow by 8.3% to reach $880.9 billion.

In line with this, marketers are continuing to increase spend in online video, social media and gaming channels, while pulling back from traditional offline media.

However, the breakneck speed at which digital spend has grown is expected to slow this year too, according to a new WARC survey of 1,700 brand leaders for its global study, The Marketer’s Toolkit 2023: Future of Media.

The data uncovered that pure-play digital ad growth had plunged to 5.5%, down from 42% in 2021 following a boom amid relaxed Covid restrictions. Going into 2023, the likes of Google and Facebook must compete harder for ad dollars as marketers change their approach media planning. TikTok will emerge from 2023 a winner, according to WARC, along with retail media platforms.

Flexible media planning

With marketers under increased pressure to deliver effectiveness and show the ROI of their budgets, over a third (34%) said media and audience fragmentation was one of their top causes for concern hearing into 2023.

As a result, marketing teams are planning to take a more fluid approach to planning, one that emphasizes the importance of communities over basic demographics in segmentation.

When asked where they expected investment to change in the coming year, 66% of marketers said they would spend more targeting interest-based fandoms, while 63% planned to invest more on gaming channels.

Over half (52%) expect to increase investment with social media influencers and creators, while a further 65% are planning to work with content creators to connect with communities “aligned with specific interests authentically tied to the brand.”

In tandem with this, TikTok—which is increasingly seen by brands as a space to tap into niche interests and cultivate personality, as well as community—ranked as the top platform for increased investment in 2023 among 76% of marketers. YouTube came in at No. 2 with 57% of marketers planning to put the Alphabet-owned platform higher on their media sheets. Google ranked third with 53%.

Nadia Morozova, global measurement and insights lead at consulting firm EY, said: “In order to stay relevant, brands need to identify communities and create messages which will appeal the most to the needs and challenges of these communities.”

She added: “From a research perspective, companies should look for ways to move from a traditional type of segmentation (age, gender, education, place of living) to segmentation based on identifying and understanding different consumer mindsets and psychological need states.”

Following an Elon Musk-induced exodus by top advertisers, Twitter was closer to the bottom of the platform pile with just 19% of advertisers saying they’d spend more there this year. Snap was on the same footing.

Defying the wider digital slowdown, retail media is becoming increasingly favored by advertisers. One of the world’s biggest ad spenders, Unilever, is among those already betting big on the medium, which according to WARC now the fourth-largest medium by ad spend. In 2022, global investment in retail media platforms amounted to $110.7 billion, which will rise to $121.9 billion in 2023, according to GroupM.

As well as power shifts, media buying will also lean toward becoming more conscious in 2023. Over half (54%) of WARC’s U.S. respondents said media planning recommendations in 2023 would include more diverse publishers, reflecting the importance of underrepresented audiences.

However, with only 34% of advertisers planning to include more low-carbon alternatives in their media plans in 2023, there’s still an education gap around how digital media in particular impacts the planet.