Wilmington, Delaware area business owners are expected to spend $197 million advertising online in 2022. This, according to Borrell Associates, a company that tracks advertising expenditures across the country.

Borrell's forecast indicates that almost 50% of Wilmington's online expenditures will be in the form of paid search. The most recognizable type of this advertising is the paid ads that appear adjacent to the results of almost every search query on Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

Borrell's forecast also indicates that approximately 27% of online expenditures will be in the form of display advertising. This consists of traditional banner ads that appear across millions of websites and apps, including social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram. According to SmallBizGenius.net, the average Wilmington area consumer is served more than 1700 of these ads per month.

Video advertising in Wilmington is forecast to account for 21% of all online ad dollars in 2022. Like search and display, millions of websites can support this type of advertising. This includes sites, apps, and platforms like YouTube, Roku Channel, Hulu, Paramount+, and most social media sites.

The remainder of online advertising dollars is expected to be spent on audio advertising, including streaming sites like Pandora and Spotify; or email marketing campaigns.

There are 19,142 small businesses in the Tri-Stare area, according to the US Census Bureau. Based on projections from the National Federation of Independent Business Owners (NFIB), nearly half of these companies have job openings they cannot fill.

As a result of the acute labor shortage, says the NFIB, 29% of small business owners rank the quality of labor as the most important problem they face. A year ago, only 21% said finding workers was their biggest issue.

The labor crunch in the Wilmington area is being driven, in big part, by a record-high number of employees voluntarily quitting their jobs. Just last month, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4.5 million employees across the country left their current place of employment.

According to the Wall Street Journal, those who are not currently working say they are in no hurry to return to the workforce. The lack of urgency stems from five primary reasons:

• 29% say they don't need to work right now because their spouse is employed
• 28% say they cannot return to work because of care responsibilities at home
• 25% say they don't need to return to work because they have a financial cushion
• 20% say they are fearful of returning to work because of COVID-19
• 5% say they do not need to return because of current unemployment benefits

There seems to be little chance that these resigned workers can be lured back into the labor force. Therefore, to fill open jobs, local business owners will need to focus their efforts towards recruiting among Wilmington's "passive" job candidates.

To ensure success, every Tri-state area business owner needs to advertise.

"Think you have a great product?" asks the US Small Business Administration. "Unfortunately, no one’s going to know about it unless you advertise.”

The SBA goes on to say, “Advertising, if done correctly, can do wonders for your product sales, and you know what that means: more revenue and more success for your business.”

There are dozens of ways for local small business owners to advertise. By most metrics, the best way to advertise is on Wilmington, Delaware radio. These measures of effectiveness, however, are often obscured by the glimmer and glitz of newer technologies. 

To help reduce the glare that often blinds business owners to the potency of advertising on Wilmington radio, here are the top five things many local business owners get wrong.

It wasn't too long ago when advertising on Wilmington, Delaware area television stations was considered the gold standard for marketing by local business owners. But over the past few years, the number of Tri-state area viewers who watch Philadelphia stations like WDPN, WPPX, KYW, WCAU, and WHYY has plummeted. In all, only 73% of adult consumers now tune-in to at least one of these channels during the week, according to Nielsen.

The consumption of video content isn't diminishing among Delaware consumers. What has changed, though, is how they are watching it.

In November, according to Nielsen, the share of time watching broadcast television has fallen behind other video options including cable programing and internet-delivered choices such as Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, and hundreds of other streaming networks.

It used to be, when a small business owner wanted to advertise on television in Wilmington, the only option was to advertise on Philadelphia stations like WDPN, WPPX, KYW, WCAU, and WHYY. But slowly, the number of options has expanded to include cable channels provided by Xfinity, DISH, DirecTV, and Verizon FIOS.

Heading in 2022, local advertisers have even more options as internet-connected devices deliver hundreds of more programming choices to Deleware consumers. Collectively, this type of content is called OTT (Over-The-Top-Television) or CTV (Connected-Television). For the purpose of this discussion, OTT & CTV will be referred to singularly as streaming video.

Streaming video can be viewed on any device that can connect to the internet. This includes computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. Programing can also be accessed using a smart-TV, Roku Stick, Amazon Fire Stick, or a game console. In all, according to Nielsen, 95.1% of Wilmington households own a device capable of receiving streaming video.

In all, says Nielsen, 379,077 Wilmington consumers watch streaming video content every week. Combined, these internet channels now reach more adults every week than local newspapers, podcasts, and digital audio services like Pandora, Spotify, Sirius/XM. Amazon Music, and iHeart Radio.

Surprisingly, streaming video now reaches almost as many Wilmington adults as local TV and local cable.

When WDEL-AM became Wilmington's first radio station in 1922, there was no Facebook, no Xfinity, no Sirius/XM, no Netflix, no podcasts, and no local TV stations.  Consequently, it was pretty easy for radio to become the number one reach medium among local consumers.

Over the past 99 years, Wilmington business owners have come to depend on the mammoth reach of radio among local shoppers to successfully market the goods and services they sell. Advertising on Wilmington radio has helped Delaware companies to survive and thrive during world wars, natural disasters, recessions, depressions, and even a pandemic.

Heading into 2022, local consumers have more media choices than ever before. But, despite the overabundance of social media, video streaming, audio streaming, cable, and other technological marvels, Wilmington radio is still the most used advertising medium.

Based on projections from the National Retail Federation (NRF), Wilmington, Delaware consumers are on track to spend $10.2-billion with retailers by the end of this year. This would be 13.5% higher than was spent in 2020.

To earn a significant share of these retail dollars, Wilmington area business owners are expected to spend $308.3 million to advertise by year's end, according to Borrell Associates. This company tracks advertising expenditures in local markets across the U.S.

To ensure they are spending their advertising and marketing dollars wisely, many Wilmington business owners research how to best target prospective customers by using local media. An exceptional resource for local business owners to investigate the media habits of localconsumers is on the advice section of AdvertiseInWilmington.com.  

Here are the top five most-read articles on the site in 2021:

Every week, according to Nielsen, 555,000 adult consumers in Wilmington, Delaware watch something on television. But, of course, the definition of what it means to watch TV has changed since the time when the number of available viewing options could be counted on the fingers of a single hand.

Today, Wilmington consumers have a gargantuan number of viewing choices. This includes programs from stations like WDPN, WPPX, KYW, WCAU, and WHYY. Or maybe cable and satellite systems like Xfinity, DISH, DirecTV, and Verizon FIOS. There's also content delivered over the internet from Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, Disney+, and Amazon Prime.

No longer are Wilmington consumers tied to the 21-inch Zenith in their living rooms. Instead, TV can be watched on giant LCDs, smartphones, and tablets from any room in the house, in the backseat of their cars, or practically anywhere else.

The best way to think about TV watching in Wilmington is in terms of three buckets:

1. Over-the-air...including all broadcast channels
2. Cable...including all premium and non-premium programming
3. Internet...including all streaming services. This is also known as OTT or CTV

Here's how many Wilmington adult viewers fall into each bucket. Remember, viewers are not limited to a single bucket.

In 2020, there were 31,876 new cars and trucks registered in the Wilmington metro area. This number is based on projections from the National Auto Dealers Associaton (NADA) and the U.S. Census bureau.

In all, says NADA, there are 53 new-car dealerships in Delaware. Despite the pandemic, these dealers, including those in the Wilmington area, sold $3 billion worth of new vehicles.

Through June of this year, these same dealers have already rung up $1.6 billion in new car sales.

When it comes to buying new vehicles, Wilmington consumers have a broad range of preferences. Some buyers want Fords while others want Chevrolets, Toyotas, or Teslas.  Some buyers want pick-up trucks, while others want sub-compacts, SUVs, or sports cars. Of course, some want blue vehicles, while others want pearl white, orchard green, or redolent red.

There is one purchase criterion, however, that most Wilmington car buyers can agree on. They want an AM/FM radio smack-dab, in the middle of their dash.

Every month, 417,513 adults in the Wilmington, Delaware area use social media, according to Nielsen. Seventy-two percent of these consumers use Facebook, far more than other sites like Instagram (also owned by Facebook), Twitter, Snapchat, Pinterest, and LinkedIn.

As a stand-alone medium, Facebook is used by more people in Wilmington than watch local TV stations. Only Wilmington area radio and local cable reach more consumers.

The large audience commanded by social media has attracted a significant amount of advertising dollars from local advertisers. According to Borrell Associates, a company that measures advertising expenditures across the county, Wilmington area businesses are expected to spend $68 million on social media advertising, a 29.8% increase over 2022. The overwhelming majority of these dollars are being spent with Facebook.

Yesterday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced the company was changing its name to "Meta".  This change, though, only affects the name of the parent company. There will be no change to the company's brands like Facebook, Instagram, or WhatsApp.

How will this name change affect Wilmington businesses that advertise on Facebook?