FierceWireless has partnered with iSpot.tv, the real-time TV ad measurement company with attention and conversion analytics from more than 7 million smart TVs, to bring you a monthly snapshot of the wireless industry's advertising spending. The results below are for the top five spenders among wireless industry brands from Oct. 1-31.
For the third time in a row the wireless industry saw an increase in spending, up to an estimated $271 million in October from $236 million in September. In total, 18 brands ran 106 spots over 45,700 times, with Verizon leading in spend once again.
(Check out how these numbers compare with October, November and December of 2016, or with February, March, April, May, June, July, August and September of this year.)
Here’s how the top brands allocated their national TV advertising budgets:
1. Verizon
- Spent an estimated $82.9 million on eight spots that ran over 7,700 times.
- Generated over 2.3 billion TV ad impressions.
- Prioritized spend on these networks: CBS, NBC and Fox.
- Prioritized spend on this programming: NFL Football, College Football and the 2017 World Series
The Verizon ad with the most spend (est. $30.1 million): “Google Pixel 2,” featuring Thomas Middleditch.
2. T-Mobile
- Spent an estimated $69.9 million on 15 spots that ran over 8,300 times
- Generated 2.6 billion TV ad impressions
- Prioritized spend on these networks: Fox, NBC and ABC
- Prioritized spend on this programming: NFL Football, the 2017 World Series and MLB Baseball
The T-Mobile ad with the most spend (est. $28.5 million): “Netflix on Us”
3. Sprint
- Spent an estimated $31.1 million on 14 spots that ran over 6,500 times
- Generated 1.3 billion TV ad impressions
- Prioritized spend on these networks: NBC, CBS and Fox
- Prioritized spend on this programming: NFL Football, NFL Thursday Night Kickoff and The Late Show With Stephen Colbert
The Sprint ad with the most spend (est. $7.8 million): “iPhone Season: iPhone Forever”
4. MetroPCS
- Spent an estimated $23.8 million on 16 spots that ran over 5,500 times
- Generated 1.1 billion TV ad impressions
- Prioritized spend on these networks: ESPN, Fox and NBC
- Prioritized spend on this programming: NBA Basketball, NBA Preseason Basketball and The Voice
The MetroPCS ad with the most spend (est. $12.6 million): “Unlimited Deal: Two 32GB Phones”
5. Cricket Wireless
- Spent an estimated $17.9 million on nine spots that ran over 2,900 times
- Generated 1.2 billion TV ad impressions
- Prioritized spend on these networks: CBS, FOX and Fox Sports 1
- Prioritized spend on this programming: NFL Football, the 2017 World Series and MLB Baseball
The AT&T Wireless ad with the most spend (est. $12.2 million): “The Right Play Any Day”
ISpot's data do not include co-promotions or local market data. Click here for more on iSpot.tv's methodology.
The company's software leverages proprietary audio and video fingerprinting algorithms to automatically identify and extract TV commercials, movie trailers and show promotions.
The company tracks hundreds of millions of explicit interactions with TV ads across roughly 100 million unique consumers. These interactions include video plays, searches and social activity. The company also analyzes online views across YouTube and iSpot.tv, searches on Google, Bing and Yahoo!, and social activity on Facebook (including Facebook private views) and Twitter.
iSpot.tv tags over 40 different dimensions of metadata, including brand, agency, actors, products, songs, moods, URLs and other pertinent data, to create its results.