Internet advertising overtakes tv - but print advertising still reigns supreme!

Internet advertising spend has finally overtaken television advertising in the first half of 2009, a report from the IAB and PriceWaterhouse Coopers reveals. The advertising report, based on figures from the Advertising Association and WARC shows that Internet advertising is the only advertising sector to grow in the first half of 2009, reaching a total of £1,750,000,000 ad spend.

For me, the next big question is – when will mobile devices outstrip pc’s? At AdStorm Advertising Agency we are seeing significant growth rates in mobile device traffic to all the websites we manage – which will presumably be reflected in future advertising trends.

The 4.6% growth covers Pay Per Click advertising, Banner Advertising and Online Classified advertising but is set against a backdrop of a 17% drop in overall advertising.

According to Guy Phillipson, chief executive of the IAB, the recession has led advertisers to look for certainty, accelerating the move in favour of Internet advertising, in turn causing the Internet to overtake TV around 6 months sooner than previously expected.

The greater measurability of Internet advertising, more individual targeting, and greater divisibility of ad impressions has made it easier for small advertisers to enter the advertising market online than with other media. Consequently, the more targeted of the conventional ad sectors were hit the hardest with print media such as classified ads, printed directories and printed display ads suffering falls between 20 and 35%.

However these figures conceal the fact that print advertising is still the largest sector with around 29% market share. Classified and display advertising are counted separately in the figures – unlike online, where classified advertising and display advertising are all chunked together.