CheezeDMG Blog

The Internet Advertising Bureau(IAB) released figures sighting a 17% rise in online advertising spend for the UK in 2008.  In total it came to £3.3bn and online marketing as a medium saw an increase in market share to 19.2% of all advertising.

While online saw this substantial growth, all other advertising saw a 3.5% drop in 2008.  This is not particulary surprising after the job cuts at ITV and Channel 5 while Channel 4’s long term future has continued to be of doubt with rumors of a merger with BBC WorldWide.

These increases are of no surprise to us here at CheezeDMG.  Online marketing provides the most accountable form of direct response advertising and our results prove that it offers significant value and potential return on investment.  Marketing budgets are increasingly being scrutinised in the current economic climate and the sesmic shift of spend towards online is clear sign that it’s the platform that can make every penny count.

The Governments online spend, for example, has tripled over the last two years as they quickly identifiy internet marketing as an increasingly effective method to communicate their messaging, services and campaigns to the public.  Figures from the Central Office of Information showed the Government spent £35.4 million last year on digital media, compared to just £12 million two years previously.

The IAB also stated within their report, carried out in partnership with PriceWaterhouseCoopers and the World Advertising Research Centre, that paid search grew by 22.7% to £1.987bn in 2008.  Another sign the accountability and responsiveness of advertising is quickly becoming a more established requirement.

Display too saw considerable increases, with rich media technology continuing to evolve, as the IAB article quite rightly points out, provides advertisers with the opportunity to effectively run TV style campaigns online within a more cost effective and direct response framework.

Martin Doyle, a TV buyer at one of the world’s largest advertising groups, mentioned this in response to the claim rich media advertising is eating into the budgets of conventional TV campaigns.

“You can claim to have effective direct response marketing through any medium, and whilst internet is most accountable and probably the best medium for that final call to action, without the strategic awareness that TV, press and radio provides, digital wouldn’t receive the traffic that it does.  I argue that digital is perhaps the most intrusive and irritating form of advertising due to its relative infancy as a medium - people are well conditioned to TV and radio ads in their everyday lives.”

I’ts a valid and thought provoking angle, though with pre-roll video, rich media ads and TV networks rolling out stimulating on-demand environments, I don’t think it will be too long before we’re as conditioned with online TV as we are offline.

Online is going from strength to strength and with the continued adoption of  and quick up take of new online platforms such as social networking and on-demand services, there is plenty of room for further growth.

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