Digital ad spend in the Netherlands 2010-2018

Digital advertising, such as on social media but also mobile search, more than doubled in the Netherlands since 2010, reaching over two billion euros in 2018. This led to a growing market share of digital ads. Of all online advertising options, search is the biggest category in the Netherlands. The annual expenditure on paid search advertising in the Netherlands was over 900 million euros, with the majority aimed at wired Internet advertising. This figure was expected to grow to roughly 1.2 billion euros by 2021.

How about social media advertising in the Netherlands?

There are no specific numbers on social media advertising for the Netherlands. Social media ads are, however, part of display advertising, one of the three big categories in digital advertising (along the above-mentioned search advertising and “classifieds and directories”). Ad spending on digital displays in the Netherlands reached around 140 million euros in 2018. This was a significant increase compared to previous years, when digital displays seemed to have difficulties in growing. 60 percent or roughly 530 million euros of all display ad spending was on mobile, which includes either advertising through a browser or in-app. In previous years, mobile did play a part in Dutch display advertising but much less so than in 2018. No reason is given for this sudden increase, although one might argue it could be attributed to the growth of Dutch influencers.

Curated video becoming more popular

Ad spending on online video in the Netherlands reached around 230 million euros in 2018, making up slightly over one quarter of all online display advertising in the country. This was an increase from previous years, a trend supported by domestic surveys. In 2019, approximately nine out of ten marketers said they used digital video, an increase of five percentage points from 2018. The expectancy among Dutch marketers to use social media videos more often in the future also increased, with approximately 60 percent of the respondents stating in 2019 they were planning to use social video "more often" or "much more often" in the next three years.