Guest Blog: Forward Looking Ad Spending

Some interesting stats from this research brief by Jack Loechner -- it looks like ad spending will be going up in the next year, which is good news for marketers:

According to ZenithOptimedia's study, "Advertising Expenditure Forecasts," global ad spending will increase 4.9% this year and grow at an annual rate between 4.6% and 5.2% over the next three years. In the U.S., ad spending will increase by 2.2% this year, and will be up by a projected 2.4% next year. Ad growth will be led by Internet advertising, which is projected to increase 12.5% next year and up an average of 10.6% a year through 2016, according to the report....

In the U.S., the media categories seeing the highest ad spending growth this year include:

• Internet driven by online video and social media. (13.5%)
• Television driven by technology (7.4%)
• Outdoor, also technology driven (3.0%)

Categories with the largest declines this year are:
• Newspapers (down 10.0%)
• B2B magazines (down 6.0%)
• Radio (down 2.6%)

The importance of the internet to advertisers is understated by these figures, because as well as creating new opportunities in paid media, it has greatly expanded brands' abilities to talk to consumers via social media, both ‘owned' (on brands' own websites and microsites, YouTube channels, Twitter and Facebook accounts and so on) and ‘earned' (conversations consumers have on forums, blogs, etc). These activities can be extremely effective, and many advertisers have embraced them enthusiastically, but most of them will never be picked up in a survey of ad expenditure, says the report.

The Times, They Are A' Changin': New Marketing Budgets

A really great article from Research Brief shows interesting trends for marketing budgets planned for 2011.  It's looking good for marketing next year -- at least half of businesses polled plan to increase their advertising budgets.  For the second year in a row, email marketing and social media marketing are expected to be the top targets for increased spending.  Here are the highlights from Strongmail's late November survey:

• 93% of businesses plan to increase or maintain marketing spend in 2010
• 41% of business cite lack of resources/staff as primary email marketing challenge in 2011; 41% data integration; 36% email deliverability
• 52% of businesses cite increasing subscriber engagement as top 2011 email marketing initiative; 49% improving segmentation/targeting; 43% integrating email and social media
• 65% of businesses plan to increase marketing budget for email; 57% social media; 41% search
• 71% of businesses plan to integrate email and social media in 2010

These numbers are very encouraging, indicating that email and social media marketing are still king in the marketing arena.  Another interesting stat claims respondents name lack of resources or staff to be the biggest marketing challenge in 2011 -- this opens up the job market for talented direct marketing individuals.

Strong goals for 2011 seem to be increasing subscriber engagement, improving segmentation and targeting, and integrating social media and email.  Social media may be the new kid on the block, but it's here to stay -- and interestingly enough, it's not knocking email marketing off its throne, either.  Business leaders know the two will have to play well together in 2011 for fully effective marketing.

You can read the survey and accompanying article in their entirety here on Mediapost.