China's ecommerce ad spending will reach $50.31 billion in 2021, which is nearly double that of the US.

Retailers, meanwhile, are embracing the transition to ecommerce. For example, Next announced plans to spend above pre-pandemic levels on marketing this year, per an April article from Marketing Week. The UK retailer also said it would prioritize digital marketing channels while pulling back on print and TV advertising.

US retail media ad spend will hit $31.49 billion in 2021, up 53.4% over 2020. By 2023, this figure will pass $50 billion, with the vast majority of retail media ad spend coming from ecommerce channels.

By 2023, marketers will spend more than $52 billion on ads across websites or apps that are mainly ecommerce focused. The biggest player in this market is Amazon, whose US advertising business is growing faster than those of the other two members of the triopoly: Google and Facebook.

Digital ad spending in the US increased by $19.79 billion last year, a nice result given the stagnancy of the country’s overall media ad market (which includes traditional formats, like TV, radio, and print, where ad spending declined by 18.1%).

Retail has accounted for more than 20% of the market ever since we began tracking digital ad spending by industry, and the pandemic-driven ecommerce explosion of 2020 has only launched retail to new digital heights.

Consumers have been stuck at home for abnormally long stretches and have embraced ecommerce as never before. Almost overnight, it became necessary for CPG manufacturers to reach their customers online.

This year's $211.20 billion in US ad spend marks a $20 billion increase from our previous projection, due in part to the stronger-than-expected performance of major digital ad companies and significant growth in ad prices. Google, Facebook, and Amazon made slight gains during the pandemic, with their share growing 1 percentage point from 63% in 2019.

The triopoly of Google, Facebook, and Amazon will rake in 64.0% of this year’s $211.20 billion in US digital ad spending, about the same share as 2020 and up 1 percentage point from 2019.