Internet replaces TV as largest advertising medium in England

 
In the coming year, total advertising expenditure on the internet in the UK is set to exceed that of television. This is according to a report by WPP subsidiary M Group, which is available to Horizont.net. According to the predictions, advertisers on the island will increase their spending on online advertising by a good 30 percent to 3.4 billion pounds in the current year. This means that online marketers will almost close the gap to television, traditionally the advertising medium with the highest turnover. However, Adam Smith, Futures Director at Group M, has no doubt that, in view of the ongoing development in favor of online opportunities, spending on the Internet in the UK will definitely exceed that on TV advertising in 2009. According to Smith, this is already the case in Sweden. In Denmark, too, it will not be long before the Internet has overtaken TV advertising.
The search engine marketing segment, which already accounted for around 58 percent of web investments in the UK in 2007 and which, according to Group M analysts, is set to grow significantly by another 35 percent this year, is likely to contribute to the further upturn in internet advertising in the UK. The two other online advertising segments analyzed by Group M - traditional display and classified advertising - are also expected to grow by 20 percent in 2008.
The situation is different in Switzerland. The market share of television advertising is still many times higher than that of internet advertising. The picture in Switzerland is similar to that in Germany, where the TV share is around 24 percent. In Germany, Smith believes it is likely that the growth of the Internet will be at the expense of print advertising. This could easily also be the case in Switzerland, where the market share of the entire print sector is over 55%.