During the 2022 midterm elections, more than $1 billion will be spent on OTT and CTV ads, research projects. With the right tools and approach, political marketers can capture opportunities within this growing landscape.

US political advertisers will splash out $8.8 billion on video in 2022, close to the record $9.5 billion spent in 2020, despite this year marking a midterm rather than presidential election.

Social media usage gains from 2020 have largely ended. Facebook will have its lowest growth rate ever, Instagram’s user base is getting older, and Twitter is coming down with a case of post-election malaise. However, TikTok and Reddit are still attracting users at an accelerated pace.

From 2017 through 2024, the ratio of national to local will hover around 2-to-1, but the gap between them tends to narrow in US election years as political campaigns pour money into local ads. This is especially true of midterm elections, which are dominated by congressional, gubernatorial, and mayoral races that lean toward local advertising.

Despite how consumers feel about it, politics remains a core part of the social media experience. This report explores how marketers should navigate social in the aftermath of the 2020 US presidential election.

The IMF expects these factors to continue to fuel Latin America’s economic growth this year despite concerns over stubbornly high inflation and looming political uncertainty as Brazil, Colombia, and Costa Rica gear up for presidential elections. As a result, Latin America’s advertising industry will benefit.

With presidential elections set for October 2022, Twitter will play a fundamental role in shaping the country’s highly polarized political discourse this year. Argentina is the only market in Latin America where Twitter’s penetration rate among internet users will decline. Twitter used to be the country’s third-most-popular social platform, but it slid to No. 4 in 2021 due to TikTok’s meteoric rise.

The upcoming US election will determine the direction for technology policies that will have a profound impact for marketers. This report will lay out scenarios for what marketers can expect in several key policy areas in 2021 and beyond.

An Amazon warehouse in New Jersey is the latest to get a union vote after similar elections in Staten Island and Alabama. 80% of New York Times tech workers voted to certify union representation in March. In March, thousands of Etsy sellers went on a weeklong strike to protest a recent hike in transaction fees and other changes.

This report explores the latest developments in the social media landscape, including a look at TikTok Global, Instagram’s launch of Reels, and new election-related moves from Facebook and Twitter.

There’s a simple cost-benefit equation to fighting unions; employers spend about $340 million a year on consultants to prevent union elections in efforts to save billions, per EPI. For example, Amazon, which has more than 750,000 hourly US employees, spent at least $4.3 million on consultants, according to Marketplace.

Efforts to unionize in the US:. 16 Starbucks stores have voted to unionize, and 150 more are holding elections. An Amazon warehouse in New Jersey is the latest to get a union vote after similar elections in Staten Island and Alabama. 80% of New York Times tech workers voted to certify union representation last month. Workers at Google, Raven Software, and Activision Blizzard are unionizing.

This is common during midterm elections, when political candidates spend heavily on local TV in the months leading up to the election. That’s why the 2022 growth in local TV ad spending (6.9% YoY) will be more than double that of national TV ad spending (2.6% YoY). More Streamers Adopt Ads.

The influx of political content and ad dollars for the upcoming US presidential election will inevitably impact commercial advertisers on social media. Understanding the political ad cycle and consumer attitudes toward political content can help brands better reach their audiences.

Why it’s worth watching: Tech workers seeking to unionize are seeing a groundswell of success but face pushback from Big Tech companies looking to stall employee efforts. 1,500 Amazon employees at a Staten Island, New York, facility are eligible to vote in the election that ends Friday night, per NPR. An Amazon warehouse across the street, with 8,300 employees, unionized earlier this month.

Even if the Bessemer vote fails, Amazon’s margin of victory will be much smaller than in the last election, signaling that workers are less intimidated by the company’s tactics.

eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver, junior analyst Blake Droesch, principal analyst Jillian Ryan, and vice president of content studio at Insider Intelligence Paul Verna discuss the major digital pivot to reimagined events amid COVID-19. Then, the usual suspects talk about Twitter's fight against election misinformation, TikTok's potential rivals, untapped marketing to lower-income customers, ecommerce within YouTube, and how cats aren't as heartless as they seem.

Brand programs in the country that focus on events, like the Olympics or elections, have been the focus of Twitter promotion. For example, the snap election in Canada in 2021 was an opportunity for many brand campaigns to promote voting on Twitter, which launched an emoji triggered by a series of hashtags.

The US election on Tuesday pits fundamentally different visions of the US against each other. It might seem trivial to look at how the election could affect the marketing world—but the impacts will be real.

eMarketer forecasting analyst Eric Haggstrom joins principal analysts at Insider Intelligence Mark Dolliver, Jeremy Goldman, and Nicole Perrin to discuss the US presidential election: media usage, effective advertising, and how big tech protected its integrity. They then talk about Apple's new privacy "nutrition labels," how a virtual reality headset can tell who you are from your movements within 5 minutes, and why The Trade Desk had such a good Q3.

eMarketer principal analyst Mark Dolliver, junior analyst Blake Droesch and vice president of content studio at Insider Intelligence Paul Verna discuss the end of Quibi, Facebook's mini social networks called "Neighborhoods," Uber reclassifying drivers as employees, whether ads near political content affect brand perceptions, the state of Facebook post-election, how long Americans spend looking for things they've lost, a creature that sleeps while moving, and more.

eMarketer junior analyst Blake Droesch and principal analysts at Insider Intelligence Debra Aho Williamson, Mark Dolliver, and Jeremy Goldman discuss how social media might change as a result of the continued spread of misinformation on the platforms and general negative sentiment surrounding them. They then talk about the best way to use Stories, influencer ad disclosure, and which consumer group has increased its social media usage the most during the pandemic.