Amazon Advertising revenues for 2023 were just shy of US$47bn. The Financial Times quoted the Q1 2024 results on May 1 as follows: “Revenue at the high-margin advertising business overall — driven predominantly by adverts linked to its ecommerce segment — rose 24% to $11.8bn during Q1 2024″.
For reference, Q4 2024 Amazon Advertising revenues reached $14bn – with the holiday season always providing an uptick.
The sheer size of the business compared to advertising holdcos – holding companies that often own several agencies that specialise in different areas of advertising such as media buying, creative, and digital – such as Publicis, Omnicom and WPP is hard to believe, but just look at the numbers:
- Amazon Advertising 2023 results: US$47bn (up 26% from 2022)
- Omnicom net revenues 2023: US$14.7bn (up 2.8% from 2022).
- WPP annual revenue for 2023 was US$18.47bn (up 3.47% from 2022).
- Publicis Groupe’s revenue for 2023 was €13,09bn (up +4.2% from 2022)
Yes, these are not like for like comparisons as the holdcos are not just media businesses. The scale is nonetheless interesting.
Another point of interest: typically, one product within Amazon Advertising is 80% of all their revenues – Sponsored Product – also called Sponsored Search.
If Amazon Advertising grows at 20% again in 2024, it will be close to a $55bn run rate. 80% of that is about $44bn. In other words, just one Amazon Advertising unit, Sponsored Product might be close the total revenues of three of the big holdcos put together.
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