Albeit
we’re in a major media recession it was interesting to see this
week’s IAB numbers showing continued growth for digital. Online
ad spend in 2008 rose 17.1% to £3.3bn, and online spend now
makes up over 19% of the overall market in the UK. The UK is still
leading the world in terms of digital advertising, but my question is
how do we maintain this position?
Firstly,
consumer insight. Consumer behaviour is changing rapidly as the web
becomes more and more important to people’s lives. Advertisers
can ensure they keep up with these consumers by being found where
they are looking for information about their products or services –
be it on social networks, blogs, video sites or on search engines.
Secondly,
as regular readers will probably guess, data. Search advertising
deals in cold, hard numbers. Advertisers can make the most of the
wealth of insight afforded by the web, especially in an advanced
market like the UK, where people spend 33 hours of their leisure time
every month on the web.
Thirdly,
integrating their media. Online advertising can make offline media
more efficient and can turbocharge offline media campaigns. What is a
consumer’s next step after seeing your press or TV ad? They’ll
probably make a trip to the online high street to find out more –
and it they can’t find you there, then you can be sure they’ll
find a competitor.
Finally,
conversions. As an industry, online stores are increasingly getting
better at setting themselves up for converting clicks into
business. But sites can always do more and continuing to test the
user journey extensively and in real time is the only way we’re
going to crack this nut.
A
downturn may well be a time when people expect more for less, but
it’s not right to do so if accuracy and effectiveness is
compromised. We mustn’t allow advertiser procurement
departments to drive out creativity, insight and brand strategy from
the digital industry, just as it’s crept in to other media
sectors. The UK has led the way in digital by following consumers
online and letting the numbers speak for themselves.
We
all have to encourage marketing and planning departments to better
use the rich vein of information and results driven by digital
media and the value of ensuring this is integrated with preexisting
media thinking to continue to demonstrate real time value.
This
will keep digital media ahead of the curve and help us all through
the recession.
