Verizon boosts summer ad spending

Verizon raised its spending on TV advertising during the month of June, according to new numbers of ad-tracking company iSpot.

The action pushed Verizon ahead of T-Mobile during the period. That's noteworthy considering T-Mobile outspent the rest of its wireless rivals in terms of TV advertising during the month of May.

FierceWireless has partnered with iSpot.tv, the real-time TV ad measurement company with attention and conversion analytics from more than 8 million smart TVs, to bring you a monthly snapshot of the wireless industry's advertising spending. The results below are from June 1-30.

In total, 22 brands spent an estimated $225.3 million on 114 commercials that aired over 55,400 times and generated 12.5 billion TV ad impressions.

Here’s how the top brands allocated their national TV advertising budgets:

1. Verizon

  • spent an estimated $51.8 million on 23 spots that ran over 9,800 times.
  • generated 2.6 billion TV ad impressions.
  • prioritized spending on these networks: Fox, ABC and NFL Network.
  • prioritized spending on this programming: the 2018 FIFA World Cup, FIFA World Cup Today and Top 100 Players of 2018.

The Verizon ad with the most spend (est. $22.5 million) was “Huge News,” featuring Thomas Middleditch.

2. Sprint

  • spent an estimated $40.1 million on nine spots that ran over 7,500 times.
  • generated nearly 2 billion TV ad impressions.
  • prioritized spending on these networks: Telemundo, NBC and ABC.
  • prioritized spending on this programming: Copa Mundial de la FIFA 2018, "American Ninja Warrior" and "America’s Got Talent."

The Sprint ad with the most spend (est. $7.7 million) was “Aunt Katy's Birthday

3. T-Mobile

  • spent an estimated $38 million on 10 spots that ran over 7,300 times.
  • generated nearly 1.8 billion TV ad impressions.
  • prioritized spending on these networks: NBC, ABC and NFL Network.
  • prioritized spending on this programming: "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon," "American Ninja Warrior" and "America’s Got Talent."

The T-Mobile ad with the most spend (est. $27.9 million) was “Get Lost in Space.”

4. AT&T Wireless

  • spent an estimated $24.9 million on eight spots that ran over 4,600 times.
  • generated over 1 billion TV ad impressions.
  • prioritized spending on these networks: NBC, Fox and ABC.
  • prioritized spending on this programming: "America’s Got Talent," World of Dance and "American Ninja Warrior."

The AT&T Wireless ad with the most spend (est. $20.3 million) was “More for Your Thing: Buy One, Get One

5. MetroPCS

  • spent an estimated $17.2 million on six spots that ran over 5,100 times.
  • generated over 1.1 billion TV ad impressions.
  • prioritized spending on these networks: Fox, ABC and Telemundo.
  • prioritized spending on this programming: Copa Mundial de la FIFA 2018, "The Bachelorette" and "America’s Got Talent."

The MetroPCS ad with the most spend (est. $13.8 million) was “Sharing With No Limits.”


iSpot's data do not include copromotions or local market data. Click here for more information on iSpot.tv's methodology.

The company's software leverages proprietary audio and video fingerprinting algorithms to automatically identify and extract TV commercials, movie trailers and show promotions.

The company tracks hundreds of millions of explicit interactions with TV ads across roughly 100 million unique consumers. These interactions include video plays, searches and social activity. The company also analyzes online views across YouTube and iSpot.tv; searches on Google, Bing and Yahoo!; and social activity on Facebook (including Facebook private views) and Twitter.

iSpot.tv tags over 40 different dimensions of metadata, including brand, agency, actors, products, songs, moods, URLs and other pertinent data to create its results.