Billy Grace sees ad budgets rise as click costs fall

Billy Grace said marketing budgets rose 17.5% in the first half of 2026, while click costs fell 10.8%.

The data, drawn from a matched cohort of hundreds of advertisers, pointed to broader shifts in where brands placed digital ad spending.

The typical business increased paid media investment year on year, even as pricing became more favourable for advertisers. Click-through rates rose 13%, while the cost of reaching 1,000 people increased 1.3%.

Two in three advertisers in the group spent more than a year earlier. The figures came from a cohort representing hundreds of millions of pounds in ad spend across the first half of 2025 and the first half of 2026.

Platform shift

The figures also showed a change in channel mix beyond the two largest digital advertising platforms. Google's share of the typical advertiser's budget fell from 62% to 57% over the period.

Some of that spending shifted to Meta, while a growing share went to smaller platforms. TikTok investment across the group rose 65%, while Reddit spending increased 650% from a small base. Bing, Pinterest and YouTube also recorded double-digit growth.

More advertisers adopted each of those channels than stopped using them. That suggests marketers were testing a wider range of outlets as costs shifted and performance improved.

Sector split

Performance varied by business model and sector. Lead-generation advertisers posted the strongest spending growth, with budgets up 26% and click volumes rising by almost half.

The same group also recorded the lowest click prices in the market, with cost per click down 21%. Ecommerce advertisers increased orders by about 10% while keeping cost per acquisition unchanged.

Among sectors, travel, transport and hospitality businesses posted the sharpest rebound in spending, up 63%. Industrial and energy was the only sector in the sample to reduce budgets.

The report measured advertiser performance using Billy Grace's Unified Marketing Measurement model, which combines marketing-mix modelling with multi-touch attribution to assess the effect of channels that may not be captured by last-click reporting.

Billy Grace was founded in Amsterdam and expanded into the UK in 2026. It works with eCommerce, retail and lead-generation companies across Europe.

Billy Grace Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer Mitch Voskuilen said the findings show advertisers are achieving stronger results by embracing new channels and taking a broader view of marketing performance rather than relying on traditional metrics alone.

"When budgets are rising and costs are falling in the same market, standing still is the one thing advertisers can't afford. The businesses that got ahead this year weren't necessarily the ones who spent the most. They were the ones who treated a flat budget as a real cut, tested new channels while they were still cheap, and judged results on the full picture rather than whichever number a platform hands back," said Voskuilen.