Global Marketing Budgets Staying Strong

August 23, 2013

This article is included in these additional categories:

Asia-Pacific | Europe & Middle East | Financial Services | Global & Regional | Staffing | Uncategorized

Warc-Global-Mktg-Budgets-Aug-2013Marketing budgets continue to improve across major regions, per Warc’s latest Global Marketing Index (GMI). This month, the budget component of the index recorded a value of 51.5, steady from last month and marking the 8th consecutive month above the threshold value of 50. (A score above 50 indicates a generally improving environment, while a score below 50 indicates a generally declining environment.) Last year, by contrast, budgets took a turn for the worse beginning in June, hitting one of the year’s low points in August.

Looking at the budget component breakdown by region, the data reveals that marketers in the Americas are still the most bullish, with a reading of 55.8. Those in the Asia-Pacific region saw a net decline in expectations, falling below the threshold of 50 to a score of 48.2, and overtaken by Europe’s sentiment score of 50 (up 0.3 points). That’s the first time in the history of the index that the outlook for marketing budgets was more positive in Europe than in the Asia-Pacific.

Other Findings:

  • The global index for staffing levels registered a sharp increase of 3.2 points to 58.2, after hitting a 6-month low in July. stood at 55, still in positive territory, but representing a 6-month low, and down from 57.1 in June. Europe posted the largest increase (+6.3 points to 59.3), with Asia-Pacific (+0.9 to 58.2) and the Americas (+2.7 to 57.8) following.
  • The index for trading conditions is still highest in the Americas, improving by 2.7 points to 61.2, indicating rapid growth. Globally, the index improved to a reading of 57.1
  • The headline global marketing index (GMI), comprised of the budget, staffing, and trading conditions components, stood at 55.6, up from 54.3. The Americas boasted the highest reading (up 1.9 points to 58.3), followed by Europe (up 1.9 points to 54.8) and Asia-Pacific (down 0.8 points to 53.8).

About the Data: Warc’s global panel (1,225 members) consists of experienced executives working for brand owners, media owners, creative and media agencies and other organisations serving the marketing industry. The panel has been carefully selected to reflect trends in the three main global regions: Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe.

Data collection period: 5-16 July 2013. The Global Marketing Index results are calculated by taking the percentage of respondents that report that the activity has risen (“Increasing”) and adding it to one-half of the percentage that report the activity has not changed (“Unchanged”). Using half of the “Unchanged” percentage effectively measures the bias toward a positive (above 50 points) or negative (below 50 points) index. As an example of calculating a diffusion index, if the response is 40% “Increasing,” 40% “Unchanged,” and 20% “Reducing,” the Diffusion Index would be 60 points (40% + [0.50 x 40%]). A value of 50 indicates “no change” from the previous month.

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