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Australia:2011 ad spend down, but not as bad as previous years
Australia’s $13bn advertising industry suffered a 1.4% fall in spending last year, but while most media reported declines, the overall drop was not as bad as other years according to the Commercial Economic Advisory Service of Australia (CEASA).
The figures, which include all spending from both media agencies and direct advertisers, show unsurprisingly that online performed well again, up by a total of 17.5% in 2011 compared to the previous year. Search and directories took the lion’s share of growth up 25.2%, classifieds were up 15.9% and general online spending rose by 4.4%.
The only two other main media to report significant increases were outdoor and pay TV up 3.4% and 3.6% respectively.
Total radio was up 0.7%, with Metropolitan radio up 1.1% and regional radio flat on -0.1%.
Metro and national dailies were down 9.2%, regional dailies fell by 14.5%, suburban papers dropped by 11.9% , while regional non-daily newspapers fell by 5.4%.
Total television dropped by 3.6%, metro TV was down 3.7% while regional TV fared slightly better recording a 1.6% drop.
Magazines slumped by 8.4% while cinema dropped by 20.8%.
CEASA chief Bernard Holt said: “By comparison with past experience a 1.4 % decrease in total advertising revenue is not big. The year ended December 1990 was the first decline ever, as measured by our series which began in 1960. 1990 went down 2%. In 1991 the total was down 6%. 2001 was down 6.9% and 2009 down 8%. The year 2010 bounced back with an increase of 7.4%.
“Our records show that from 1960 to 1990 media advertising revenue in Australia showed a constant increase year on year. 1990 was the year that former prime minister, Paul Keating, declared that we were having ‘the recession we had to have’. From that year on our figures show that media advertising revenue in Australia experienced a boom and bust cycle. And the cycle was not uniform. It also featured sharp ups and downs. In most cases recovery was strong.
“It was clear that during these cyclical downs , once the bottom was reached, marketing directors had prevailed on top management to support brands with continued advertising as a very important element of the marketing mix. It had been clearly established over painful experience that neglect of a brand would lead to a speedy decline and loss. In any case, all marketers had to advertise to keep the sales rolling. Both these elements apply today which makes us realise that the recovery graph is not far off once the American, British, European financial difficulties become contained and confidence returns.”