Internet Overtakes TV to Become UK’s Biggest Advertising Medium

Being a ‘new media’ geek, I was thrilled to read a new report published by the Internet Advertising Bureau which shows online advertising expenditure in the UK has overtaken television. Internet spend grew by 4.6% to £1,752.1m/$2,791m to a record market share of 23.5%, while TV spending collapsed 16.1% to £1,639m/$2,610m.

It beggars belief to think that the internet has already taken over the all-mighty television when online had almost a 0% market share as recently as 1999 as the following chart depicts:

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This pie chart shows where advertising budgets were spent in the first half of 2009:

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The recession has accelerated the migration of advertising spend from traditional media such as print, radio and television to online according to the report. IAB chief executive Guy Phillipson says online advertising will continue to grow: “We could see absolutely see it grow to being a 30% medium (of ad share spend), to go past £4bn to even £5bn annually”.

The UK remains the place where it’s all happening, with the world’s highest market share of ad spend going online.

When I ditched a long-standing career in old media to start a pure play dot.com company in 1997, most people were critical of my decision. Not understanding the internet or appreciating its potential, many of my journalist colleagues stuck to their cosy jobs while I thrust myself into cyberspace because I was adamant the internet would destroy much of traditional media.

It’s not a decision I made with any pleasure, and every time I hear about a newspaper closing down or a book publisher shedding staff, it upsets me because I always have been and always will be an aficionado of print, but one can’t be a Luddite and has to move with the times.

In the same way, is your business still clinging to some antiquated and ineffective forms of marketing just because that’s what you’ve always done? Big and small companies alike are shifting their advertising budgets to the web, because it is cost-effective, accountable and measurable. Azam Marketing has not jumped on board the internet advertising bandwagon in the last few years, with staff who are learning the ropes, but has been at the thick of the action since 1997, and so if you would like to acquire new customers by advertising on the most powerful medium in the world, we are the people you should contact.