Advertisers of the month in Australia: Budget Direct, Uber Eats & WhatsApp

Australia’s Advertisers of the Month for May 2025 are Budget Direct, Uber Eats, and WhatsApp, thanks to increases in ad awareness as tracked by YouGov BrandIndex. Ad awareness measures the percentage of consumers who have seen an advertisement for a brand in the past two weeks.

Budget Direct leads with a rise of 6 percentage points in ad awareness, moving from 22.5% on April 26 to 28.5% on May 21. This surge is presumably attributed to the launch of its 'Balloons' campaign, which features the brand's insurance detectives, Sarge, Jacs, and Chief, rescuing a mother whose car is lifted into the air by an excessive number of party balloons. Developed by 303 MullenLowe Sydney, the campaign marks a shift towards a lighter tone while continuing the 'Insurance Solved' narrative. It also celebrates Budget Direct’s recent win of Money magazine’s 'Best-Value Car Insurer for 2025'.

Uber Eats follows with an increase of 5.3 percentage points, rising from 26.1% on May 4 to 31.4% on May 22. The brand’s ad awareness growth may be linked to its expansion into regional areas, including Mareeba and Port Douglas, after the company decided it will expand into 67 new regional locations throughout 2025.

WhatsApp rounds out the top three with a gain of 5.2 percentage points, increasing from 12.2% on April 26 to 17.4% on May 25. The increase is likely driven by the launch of its largest privacy-focused marketing initiative to date, the 'Not Even WhatsApp' campaign. This global campaign emphasizes the platform’s commitment to user privacy, highlighting that even WhatsApp cannot access users' messages.

Methodology: YouGov BrandIndex collects data on thousands of brands every day. A brand’s ad awareness score is based on the question: “Which of the following consumer brands have you seen an advertisement for in the past two weeks?” (% Yes). Data from surveys of adults aged 18 years and above residing in Australia from 26 April to 25 May 2025. Ad Awareness scores are based on a four-week moving average. The change in scores for each brand is calculated by taking the difference between the highest and lowest scoring days within the period.