Asset managers shift to brand campaigns in North America

Record share of brand campaigns sees fund promotion drop to its lowest share since the start of 2020, data by Fundamental Monitor shows

Key points:

Asset managers dedicated a record share of their North American advertising to brand campaigns during Q4 to the detriment of fund promotion
The overall percentage of advertising dedicated to one of the key strategies has dropped significantly during 2022, particularly due to less advertising being dedicated to equities and ETFs
Surprisingly, while all other main asset classes were down, ESG saw an increase during Q4, to a record 9% of all advertising

Asset managers dedicated a record share of their North American advertising to brand campaigns during Q4 to the detriment of fund promotion, according to data by Fundamental Monitor.

Brand campaigns made up 53% of all advertising, up from 28% in Q3 and the highest percentage seen since the start of 2020, when Fundamental Monitor started keeping track of asset managers’ advertising behaviour. The popularity of brand campaigns has mainly been to the detriment of fund promotion, which has fallen to 30% in Q4, its lowest level since the beginning of 2020. Insights made up 16% of all advertising in Q4, down from 22% in Q3.

Q4 2022 NA ad purpose_original

The overall percentage of advertising dedicated to one of the key strategies has dropped significantly during 2022, particularly due to less advertising being dedicated to equities and ETFs. Equities made up 23% of all North American advertising in Q3, but this fell to 5% in Q4. The percentage of advertising dedicated to the promotion of ETFs has fallen from a record high of 57% in Q4 2021 to 33% in Q3 2022 and to 10% in Q4 2022. Fixed income was only down slightly, from 4% in Q3 to 3% in Q4.

Surprisingly, while all other key strategies were down, ESG saw an increase during Q4. Traditionally, ESG investing in North America has lagged behind that in Europe and Asia Pacific and the percentage of overall advertising dedicated to the promotion of ESG was therefore usually in the low single digits and never exceeding 5%. The 9% seen in Q4 is the largest percentage ever and it’ll be interesting to see if this trend will continue into 2023.

Q4 2022 NA key strategies_original

Despite most of the key strategies seeing a drop in their share of total advertising, the number of asset management firms that were promoting these strategies hasn’t seen the same level of change. There were 12 asset managers advertising equities in Q4, up from 9 in Q3, while the number of advertisers promoting fixed income grew from 18 to 20 advertisers. On the other hand, there was a drop in the number of active advertisers for ETFs (from 28 to 25) and ESG (from 22 to 18).

Q4 2022 NA advertisers_original