Snapchat Ad Revenue in UK Will Pass £100 Million in 2018

Snapchat Ad Revenue in UK Will Pass £100 Million in 2018
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In its first-ever ad revenue forecast for Snapchat, eMarketer expects the mobile social network to generate almost £105 million ($135 million) in UK revenues this year, almost double the amount from the prior year.

In 2015, Snapchat derived 95.9% of its global ad revenues from the US. This year, that proportion will fall to 75.8%, as the platform continues to add users outside its core geography. The UK will account for 10% of Snap’s worldwide revenues in 2018.

While Snapchat has seen, and will continue to see, explosive growth in both users and ad revenues, it will make up just less than 1% of UK digital ad spend this year. By comparison, Facebook will grab more than a fifth of UK ad spend. A fairer comparison would be with Instagram, but even here Snapchat’s revenues won’t measure up, with the Facebook-owned platform expected to pull in 5% of all digital ad spend. Combined, Google and Facebook will dominate the UK digital market for the foreseeable future; this year, they will take more than 60% of all UK digital ad revenues.

“Snapchat continues to pull in users and, by extension, ad revenues,“ said Bill Fisher, eMarketer’s UK senior analyst. “An almost doubling of revenues in 2018 is a great result. But while the user base continues to be dominated by younger age groups, that revenue potential will remain somewhat restricted. And with the financial muscle of Facebook behind close-competitor Instagram, Snap’s going to have to work ever harder for those ad dollars.“