It’s attainable to get an correct estimate of your rivals’ advert spend. You don’t should guess.
Past satisfying your curiosity, understanding how a lot your rivals spend on adverts helps you make higher selections about your price range allocation to maintain your advertising and marketing efforts efficient.
This information reveals how you can estimate competitor advert spend throughout show, social, video, and paid search adverts. And what you are able to do with that data.
Tips on how to See Rivals’ Estimated Advert Spend with AdClarity
The AdClarity app permits you to estimate rivals’ digital advert spend, see the place their adverts seem, and consider how their investments change over time.
AdClarity gives data on advert spend throughout show, social, and video adverts. And you may see outcomes by advertiser, writer, marketing campaign, and key phrase.
With AdClarity, you may:
- Examine a number of rivals to see variations in estimated spend, impressions, and advert placement in a single dashboard
- Monitor spending developments over time utilizing quite a lot of filters
- Analyze advert spend distribution throughout placements and programmatic vs. direct shopping for
- Determine top-performing adverts and campaigns primarily based on impression quantity
- Export studies for stakeholders to assessment
If you enter an advertiser’s area into AdClarity, you’ll see a report that reveals an total view of advert spend throughout all units and channels.
Right here’s how you can use AdClarity to estimate advert spend on every important channel:
Estimate Show Advert Spend
Use AdClarity to estimate how a lot your rivals are spending on their show adverts by coming into a rival area within the search bar with the “Advertisers” tab chosen, clicking the “All channels” drop-down, and choosing “Show.”
This filtered Advertiser report reveals that Costco spent $489,100 for 162.1 million impressions on show adverts within the final three months. The report additionally reveals that Costco’s show adverts common 12.5 million weekly impressions, price $37,400 per week, and seem throughout 287 publishers per week.
Additional down within the Advertiser report, you may see that Costco’s high advert by impressions is an advert for a Lenovo PC.
If you click on on any advert within the “Prime adverts” part, you may entry extra particulars in regards to the advert, together with the advert kind (e.g., banner) and dimensions, when the advert ran, the advert’s CPM, and extra.
AdClarity additionally provides you the choice to go from a person advert to a full marketing campaign report and the marketing campaign’s touchdown web page. And you may export data from AdClarity for displays and inside notes.
Again in the primary Advertiser report, scroll right down to see that Costco’s high marketing campaign accounts for 18.95% of the corporate’s complete show advert impressions. And that they spent $87,360 on this marketing campaign, which is 17.86% of their complete show advert price range.
Even additional down within the Advertiser report, you see which publishers account for many of Costco’s advert placements and Costco’s advert shopping for strategies for show adverts.
Under, you may see that Costco spent $187,510 by advert networks, totaling 38.34% of their show advert price range throughout this era.
Estimate Social Media Advert Spend
Select “Social” from the channels drop-down on the high of the Advertiser report back to see details about the entered competitor’s advert spend on social.
Within the first row of widgets, you’ll see estimated expenditure, social advert placement, and social advert varieties.
You may also see that Costco averaged 10.6 million weekly common impressions for social adverts, spent a median of $66,900 per week on social adverts, and appeared throughout a median of 4 publishers. This is smart given social adverts solely seem on social media platforms.
Scrolling down the Advertisers report reveals that Costco’s high advert on social media within the final three months was for MegaFood nutritional vitamins, which price them $250,500 to run and earned 45.7 million impressions.
If you click on on the advert, AdClarity reveals that it was revealed on Fb. You may also view different metrics in regards to the advert and the marketing campaign it was part of.
The underside of the Advertiser report reveals particulars about Costco’s high social media campaigns and distribution throughout platforms.
Estimate Video Advert Spend
To make use of AdClarity to estimate how a lot your rivals are spending on their video adverts, choose “Video” from the channels drop-down.
The Advertiser report will then present estimated expenditure, video advert placement, and video advert shopping for strategies. Right here, we are able to see that Costco spent $685,600 for 77.8 million impressions during the last three months and relied totally on programmatic as their advert shopping for technique.
As with the earlier two sections, the “Advertiser expenditure developments” part reveals developments and averages associated to Costco’s advert impressions, spend, and many others.
Additional down within the Advertiser report, you may see the highest video adverts for Costco. And you may click on into any advert to see extra particulars about it and the bigger marketing campaign it belongs to.
As soon as once more, the “Prime campaigns” part reveals Costco’s highest-performing advert campaigns—this time particularly for video advert campaigns. And the “Prime publishers” part confirms that Costco’s highest advert spend and impression rely got here from YouTube video adverts.
For those who click on on the “YouTube” row within the “Prime campaigns” part, you’ll see YouTube-specific data. The “YouTube channels” part reveals which YouTube channels Costco’s video adverts appeared on. Which is beneficial for making a aggressive advert technique.
Examine Advert Spend Throughout Channels
Now, you may see that Costco’s advert spend on every channel during the last three months is as follows:
- Show adverts: $489,100 for 162.1 million impressions
- Social adverts: $880,400 for 139.6 million impressions
- Video adverts: $685,600 for 77.8 million impressions
Use this breakdown to match your personal advert channel distribution in opposition to your rivals’. And make selections about the place it’s possible you’ll need to make investments and the place it’s possible you’ll need to pull again.
Evaluation your present price range break up and alter primarily based in your targets, competitor insights, and obtainable sources.
Tips on how to See Rivals’ Estimated Paid Search Advert Spend with Promoting Analysis
Estimate rivals’ paid search advert spend utilizing Semrush’s Promoting Analysis software, which additionally reveals the key phrases your rivals’ adverts seem for.
Enter a competitor’s area and go to the “Positions” tab in Promoting Analysis. This report reveals particulars in regards to the competitor’s paid key phrases, estimated visitors, price per click on, paid search positions, and extra.
The “Visitors Price” metric is the estimated common month-to-month price to indicate in Google for the listed key phrases primarily based on price per click on (CPC) and place information. It provides you a sensible estimate of what a competitor could also be spending on paid search.
Understanding what a competitor is paying for search adverts provides you a benchmark on your pay-per-click (PPC) price range. To offer you concepts on how you can alter your PPC technique.
Within the instance beneath, the Promoting Analysis software estimates that Costco must spend $140,100 to indicate for all its listed key phrases.
If we multiply $140,100 by three, we are able to estimate that Costco spent about $420,300 on Google search adverts throughout the identical three-month interval we analyzed in AdClarity.
Use Competitor Advert Spend Knowledge to Refine Your Technique
Use competitor advert spend information to:
- Benchmark your advert spend: Examine complete spend to see how a lot rivals are investing and whether or not you might want to alter to compete
- Discover channel alternatives: Analyze how rivals distribute their advert budgets amongst channels to determine the place competitors is strongest or the place there could also be alternatives
- Monitor spending developments over time: View information over time to identify seasonal spikes or sustained will increase in funding which may be price addressing
- Decide keyword-level competitors: Search for excessive prices that point out extremely aggressive phrases. And determine whether or not it’s extra advantageous to compete straight or pursue much less aggressive alternatives.
Needless to say AI-powered search experiences like Google’s AI Overviews can affect click on conduct. Our personal analysis reveals that the variety of search engine outcomes pages (SERPs) containing each adverts and AI Overviews grew dramatically in 2025.
Whereas some entrepreneurs fear that AI Overviews might reduce visibility for and clicks on adverts, extra alternatives for paid search are rising. Google is already testing adverts straight inside AI Overviews.
FAQs About Doing a Competitor Advert Spend Evaluation
How Correct Are Semrush’s Competitor Advert Spend Estimates?
The AdClarity app and Promoting Analysis software present extremely correct estimates primarily based on advert placements, impressions, CPC information, and place monitoring. These figures aren’t precise budgets, however they provide dependable estimates for benchmarking and development evaluation.
Can I See My Rivals’ Precise Advertisements in Semrush?
Sure, AdClarity reveals show, social, and video adverts, together with details about placements and efficiency. And Promoting Analysis reveals a competitor’s precise search adverts within the “Advertisements Copies” tab.
What’s a Good Advert Spend Benchmark for My Trade?
There’s no common benchmark for advert spend—it varies by trade, progress stage, and aggressive stress. Analyze rivals in your trade to determine a baseline, then alter primarily based in your targets and sources.
How Usually Ought to I Monitor Competitor Advert Spend?
Month-to-month monitoring of rivals’ advert spend is enough for many companies, although it’s possible you’ll need to do it extra ceaselessly throughout necessary instances like product launches and seasonal peaks.
