US Ad Expenditures Up 3.2% in 1st Half 2011

September 13, 2011

kantar-ad-spend-change-1st-half-11-sep-11.JPGTotal US advertising expenditures in the first six months of 2011 increased 3.2% from a year ago and finished the period at $71.5 billion, according to data released in September 2011 by Kantar Media. Spending growth eased slightly during the second quarter and was up 2.8% compared to last year.

Internet media accounted for more than one-half of the dollar gain in total ad expenditures during the first six months of the year (see more about digital advertising at MarketingVox). Within the internet media category, display spending jumped 12.9% and search investments rose 8.6%, as Kantar analysis indicates each benefited from a surge of money from the travel, local service and insurance categories.

Outdoor advertising had the second-highest rate of growth (11.8%), and was paced by what Kantar determined were healthy increases from local service businesses, banks and TV media outlets. Consumer Magazine ad spending pulled back in Q2 and finished the half year period up 4.0 percent. Prescription drug advertising in magazines picked up during the spring months but these gains were neutralized by cutbacks from auto manufacturers.

Cable Spend Up, Network Spend Down

Within the TV sector, which experienced 1.8% growth overall, expenditures on cable networks increased 11.8% during the first half of the year while network TV spending fell 7.6 percent. Kantar analysis suggests one factor shaping these results was the shift of BCS college football bowl games and NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament programming from broadcast networks to cable, producing a large, one-time transfer of ad dollars. Supplementing this was a reallocation of TV budgets from network to cable within the prescription drug, financial service and consumer package goods categories.

Syndication TV expenditures surged 18.5%, reflecting more hours of monitored programming and larger budgets from auto insurers and consumer package goods marketers. Spanish language TV had a 1.7% increase, while outlays on spot TV fell by 0.9 percent, reflecting weakness from the telecom category and a slowdown in Q2 spending by auto manufacturers.

Top 10 Advertisers Spend Slightly Less

kantar-top-10-advertisers-1st-half-11-sep-11.JPGSpending among the 10 largest advertisers in the first six months of 2011 was about $8,.2 billion, a 0.5% decrease compared to a year ago. Procter & Gamble maintained its top-ranked position with spending of almost $1.4 billion, down 7.8%. Kantar says the company has been shifting budgets into Spanish language media and internet display at the expense of consumer magazines, network TV and cable TV.

AT&T was the second-largest advertiser for the half-year period with expenditures of about $1.1 billion, a decline of 2.6%. Since the March 2011 announcement of its agreement to purchase T-Mobile, AT&T ad spending has slowed sharply. At competitor Verizon Communications, first-half ad budgets were $808.7 million, a decrease of 22.5% and the biggest percentage decline among the top 10 advertisers.

Meanwhile, Chrysler Group hiked ad budgets by 58.7% to $621.1 million, the largest rate of increase among the top 10. Kantar analysis indicates spending was bolstered by several marketing introductions for new and redesigned models. Fellow automaker General Motors reduced its six-month expenditures by 13.3%, to $924.6 million. The proportion of GM’s ad budget earmarked towards passenger cars, as opposed to SUVs and pickups trucks, continues to expand and is now at its highest level in more than four years.

L’Oreal investments rose 25.% to $626.3 million. Comcast (+35.1% to $884.5 million) and Time Warner (+6.7% to $618.2 million) also upped their ad budgets. Results for both companies were driven by their movie studio divisions.

Spending in 10 Largest Categories Grows 5%

kantar-top-10-ad-categories-1st-half-11-sep-11.JPGExpenditures for the ten largest categories grew 4.8% in the first half of 2011 to almost $41 billion. Automotive was the top category with almost $6.9 billion of spending in the six-month period, up 9.3%.

Meanwhile, the local services category had the strongest rate of growth among the top 10 with a 10% increase to almost $4.9 billion. Kantar says this performance is consistent with the category’s weighting towards mid-sized advertisers, a segment that has been spending robustly.

Escalating competition among credit card marketers was the catalyst for a 5.6% jump in financial services expenditures, to $4.6 billion. The travel & tourism category entered the top 10 with outlays of $2.9 billion (up 6%) as marketers launched campaigns targeting the peak spring and summer travel seasons.

Other Findings

  • AT&T was the top TV advertiser, spending $789.4 million (down 3.7%).
  • Progressive Corp. was the top internet advertiser, spending $164.7 million (up 104.6%).
  • News Corp. was the top newspaper advertiser, spending $285.4 million (down 22.8%).

Nielsen: Global Ad Spend Rises 9% in Q1 ’11

Global advertising spend rose 8.8% year-over-year in Q1 2011 to total $118 billion USD based on published rate cards, according to Nielsen Global AdView Pulse data. Nielsen analysis indicates heavier TV spending, as well as increased investment in the Latin American and Asian consumer markets, drove growth.

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