Online advertising market continues to develop positively in 2016, but grows less strongly than in 2015

Online advertising segments

The Media Focus advertising statistics only include the display advertising segment. The advertising segments of search engine advertising, affiliate marketing, online classifieds and online directories are supplemented by expert estimates. The following describes how the various online advertising segments can be characterized and differentiated from one another.

Classic online advertising

The classic online advertising segment (display) includes all forms of advertising (standard banner formats and native ads) on all devices (desktop and mobile). The billing methods used are generally fixed, contact or click prices. The data from the Media Focus advertising statistics (gross billed) is extrapolated for this report. The moving image sub-segment is assessed separately and specifies the video ad advertising format. Cross-border advertising placements (CH advertising on foreign websites) are not taken into account.

Search engine advertising

Search engine advertising refers to advertising options in which the advertiser pays for a position for its link on the popular search engines. Usually, an auction procedure is used to determine who gets the best position. The billing method of search engine advertising is payment by number of clicks on the text-based links.

Affiliate marketing

The affiliate marketing segment is part of performance marketing and is billed on a performance basis. Billing is normally based on CPO, CPL and, in some cases, CPC. Advertising material is integrated on a large number of websites, for example by means of display ads, text links, product feeds or special integrations. Affiliate marketing measures are usually carried out via a network and generally have a long-term orientation. The advertising client provides advertising material and remuneration as part of the "affiliate program", while the website makes the main decision as to which advertising material is delivered when, where and how.

Online classifieds market & online directories

The online classifieds market refers to the online classifieds business. For this report, the classifieds areas "Real Estate", "Auto" and "Job" are taken into account. The online directories advertising segment comprises the paid entries of a directory search platform, such as paid additional entries, highlighting ads or a logo entry.

Online trend by advertising segment: Absolute development 2011 - 2016

The online advertising market continues to develop positively. The search engine advertising segment is particularly strong at 450 million Swiss francs. The expert panel estimated the total volume of the Swiss online advertising market in 2016 at just over 1.1 billion Swiss francs.

Online trend by advertising segment: Segment mix 2016

Compared to the previous year, there were only slight shifts in share in the following two advertising segments: The advertising segment Classic online advertising (Display) lost a total of 3 percentage points compared to the previous year (2015, 26%). The Search engine advertising gained 3 percentage points compared to the previous year (2015, 37%).

Growth 2008 - 2016

The growth forecast for 2016 as a whole is 12.2%. This means that growth is significantly below the previous year's figure (2015, 19.3%).

Growth forecast 2016 - 2019

According to the experts' estimates, the online advertising market is continuing its stable development. However, the annual growth of the online advertising market is estimated by the experts to be lower than in the previous year (2015, 13%). Compared to the advertising volume in 2016, the experts estimate annual growth of 10.3% on average until 2019.

Share of online advertising in the Swiss advertising market 2016

The share of online advertising includes the advertising forms display, search engine advertising and affiliate marketing. To maintain comparability, online sections and directories were not included in this analysis, as no sections or directories are recorded in other media groups either.

Online advertising (display) by sector in 2016

The table shows that the finance and vehicles sectors generated the most gross advertising pressure of all 21 sectors in 2016 as a whole. The former generated gross advertising pressure of CHF 40.8 million. The vehicle sector followed in second place with CHF 24.8 million.

In 2016 as a whole, two sectors achieved an online media mix share of over 10%: the financial sector recorded a figure of 12.8%. In the telecommunications sector, the online media mix share (display) was 8.6%. The average online media mix share in 2016 was slightly lower than in the previous year (4.2%) at 3.9%.