Political Ads Keep Saving Local TV

Thanks in large part to the campaign spending flood unleashed in 2010 by the Supreme Court’s landmark Citizens United ruling and the DC Circuit Court of Appeals’ SpeechNOW.org decision, local broadcast television remains that rare legacy media business where things are still looking up. Political advertising spending on TV is projected to hit $4.4 billion in the 2016 election cycle, up from $3.8 billion in 2012, according to Kantar Media’s Campaign Media Analysis Group, with about three-quarters of that going to local broadcast stations.

The key reason why political advertisers have stayed so loyal to TV while other advertisers have been straying has to do with the target demographic. Product advertisers have traditionally sought out consumers in the 25-to-54 age range because they spend the most. Political advertisers are more interested in reaching people older than that because they are the most likely to vote. And while younger viewers have been abandoning traditional TV, older ones have stayed quite loyal.