The global Out-of-Home (OOH) industry finds itself in an interesting position: as with other mainstream media it's facing the challenge of rampant big tech but, uniquely, that is an opportunity in itself as digital OOH carves out a bigger share of the market.

Global advertising is forecasted to reach about $900bn this year, with online taking 70%. That still leaves $270bn for other media, assuming online continues its dominance (much of it from search.) $270bn is far more than the entire ad market was worth ten years ago ($187bn.)

Here are some trends:

1. Recovery from the pandemic: The OOH industry has recovered from the pandemic when it was hit harder than most media, reaching 2019 levels last year with most analysts forecasting strong growth in 2024 and beyond. Digital Out-of-Home (DOOH) is the main driver by revenue although classic (static) OOH remains the biggest by volume in many parts of the world.

2. Measurement is crucial for growth and that has been a problem for OOH in many parts of the world with different countries and media owners using different systems and some no system at all. The World Out of Home Organization has been instrumental in making the case for more consistent, reliable and easy-to-use data and significant progress has been made although there is much more to do.

3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is having a huge impact on the media industry, particularly the agency planning and buying side. Programmatic is now a fact of life and set to become even bigger, as more of the decisions made by media agencies are made by machines not humans. This means that measurement gains even more in importance - we need to give the machines what they need too. 

4. Consolidation in OOH ownership is inevitable after a post-pandemic period when there have been relatively few such deals. Private Equity, in particular, will be a major buyer.

5. OOH's opportunity to be an impactful medium: On the part of many advertisers there is a growing realisation that impact is becoming harder to achieve with so much media available, especially online. OOH has a unique opportunity to expand into this space, given its prominence in many of our cities and status as an affordable 'broadcast' medium. TV, the previous leader, is slowly but surely, losing its place as the high impact medium as its reach reduces. 

Value is not pushed hard enough, which is surprising when one analyses the low and extremely competitive Cost per Impression (CPM) being delivered by our channel.

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