The latest annual study, just released, showcases a full 2023 view. The study reports that UK advertisers spent £29.6bn on digital marketing, representing an optimistic 11% growth year-on-year. In 2022 spend in UK digital advertising was recorded at £26.62 bn.

Search continued to drive the majority of digital advertising spend, accounting for half of all adspend and growing by 12% year-on-year.

Within this annual study the IAB UK and PwC create a sub-report specifically measuring the size of the UK affiliate marketing industry.

The headline figure for 2023 is that advertiser spend in affiliate marketing grew 4% on the previous year, with the industry now being worth £1.10bn (up from £1.06bn in 2022).

The channel’s overall growth of 4% in 2023 under-indexed the 11% growth across digital advertising as a whole. This is a reversal of the situation in 2022, where affiliate marketing’s 33% growth significantly outstripped digital’s more modest 11%.

The slowdown in the UK’s affiliate growth in 2023 most likely stems from the difficulty of recreating such a sizeable growth rate in 2022. But it may also be a signal that the channel needs to find a way to capture advertising budgets that are being spent in 2023’s highest-growth areas of podcasting (23%), connected TV (21%) and Digital out-of-home, which was measured as a standalone channel by the IAB for the first time.

The data - divided by mobile and non-mobile - showed growth from mobile up 6% year on year, with growth from non-mobile up a more modest 2% year on year.

For more information on the IAB Digital Adspend Report see the IAB UK website.