GfK survey: How Swiss companies advertise
Print advertising is the most popular among Swiss companies. In comparison, alternative forms of advertising such as social media or recommendation marketing are still little used, but they will gain in importance in the coming years. This is the conclusion of a recent GfK study.
Three quarters of Swiss companies still rely on classic print advertising such as advertisements. However, new forms of advertising are attracting increasing attention. That is the conclusion of a comprehensive GfK study commissioned by the Zurich advertising agency Webguerillas. Social media marketing in particular has become established. More than one in three companies includes this alternative form of advertising in its repertoire. While recommendation marketing is still used by a quarter of the marketing managers surveyed, only one in ten has already gained experience with guerrilla marketing or viral concepts. Newer disciplines, for example app marketing or idea generation projects (crowdsourcing), have not yet established themselves.
According to the Webguerillas study, however, companies want to rely more on alternative advertising in the future. Here, too, social media marketing has the highest priority: one in five companies has not yet used this form of advertising, but plans to do so. Around ten percent of companies want to use blog marketing, search engine optimization, recommendation marketing or APP marketing in the future. Alternative forms of advertising are seen primarily as a supplement to conventional advertising. More than 80 percent of companies are investing in new forms of advertising, but the budget for this is small: as a rule, investments are below 5 percent of the total marketing budget. However, those responsible anticipate an increasing willingness to invest in alternative advertising. The strengths of new forms of advertising are seen in addressing new target groups and generating additional reach.
Companies are cautious about user-generated content. The most widespread are comment functions, which 40 percent of companies use, and sharing options. Only one in six or fewer companies use voting, blogs, forums, tagging or wikis. There is also a need to catch up with social media: Less than a quarter of Swiss companies, for example, have a social media strategy or offer their customers exclusive insights.
Webguerillas, a full-service agency for alternative forms of advertising, also conducted the same study in Germany: Thus, new forms of advertising are generally used less in Switzerland than in Germany. This applies in particular to social media marketing, mobile marketing, blog concepts or viral concepts. On the other hand, print advertising, sales promotion and direct marketing are more popular in Switzerland. Half of German companies also spend up to 20 percent of their budget on alternative advertising, while only a third of Swiss companies have a similar budget.
