How Asset Management Firms Are Raising Brand Awareness via Display Ads

Key Takeaways

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Digital Advertising Focus — Increase in Display Ad Spend: Both J.P. Morgan and PIMCO increased their display spend significantly by +37% and +52% respectively (2019 vs. 2020), highlighting that display advertising is a main focus for their digital marketing strategy. BlackRock is the only competitor that saw a decrease in YoY display spend (-64%). However, display advertising still makes up 79% of their total advertising spend for the year 2020.

Display Tactic — Rise of Mobile Display Ads: While desktop ads significantly outnumber mobile ads, the share of mobile ads has been slowly increasing over the last five years. In 2020, BlackRock allocated 42% of their total display advertising budget towards mobile ads, while J.P. Morgan and PIMCO both allocated only 6% of their budget towards mobile. This highlights an area of opportunity, as there is less direct competition on the mobile platform.

With mobile screen times at an all time high, it is more important than ever to advertise on mobile devices. 

Display Tactic — 90% of Total Display Budget is Allocated to the Top 10 Publishers: All three firms advertise on Marketwatch and Wall Street Journal, with Marketwatch being the top website with over $3.2M in advertising dollars allocated towards this website. Outside of Finance-related websites, asset management firms are advertising on entertainment sites (people.com), and general news sites (cnet.com).
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Display Tactic — Telling A Story via Display Video Ads: Both PIMCO and BlackRock’s top display campaign was a video ad. BlackRock ran a series of three videos advertising Megatrend ETFs and Sustainable ETFs. Through the use of a video, BlackRock was able to tell a compelling story about a young girl coming up with new innovations, and related this character to their Megatrend ETFs, which help consumers spot the next big innovation.

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In 2020 J.P. Morgan spent $9.2M on display advertising for its Asset Management & Investments division. PIMCO and BlackRock invested $3.8M and $3.0M in display ad spend respectively.

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While both J.P. Morgan and PIMCO have increased their display advertising spend in 2020, BlackRock decreased their display ad spend by -51% YoY.

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Display ads took the largest share of digital advertising budgets for all three firms - 100% of PIMCO’s advertising since 2016 have been display ads.

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While desktop display ads significantly outnumber mobile ads, the share of the latter has been slowly increasing over the last five years.

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The top purchasing channel is direct, followed by DSP (Demand-Side Platform), such as DoubleClick and The Trade Desk.

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More than 90% of total direct display budget is allocated to the top 10 publishers and drives ~90% impressions.

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All three firms advertise on Marketwatch and Wall Street Journal. In total, over $3.2M was spent on marketwatch.com.

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J.P. Morgan aims to educate their customers by directing users to educational resources and portfolio stress test tools.

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BlackRock’s top display campaign consisted of a series of three videos which advertised general iShares ETF, Megatrend ETFs and Sustainable ETFs. Each display video ad contained the slogan “get a new perspective on your portfolio”.

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The top PIMCO display ad was a 30 second display video ad which advertised long lasting, confident, and reliable bonds.