IPA Survey – Marketers more confident

UK marketers remain more confident about their own company’s prospects than the outlook for their industries as a whole, according to the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising’s (IPA) Bellwether Confidence Index, exclusive to Marketing Week.

Amid a general downturn in budgets, the quarterly survey reveals that 41 per cent of marketers are more upbeat about their own company’s prospects compared with 35 per cent the previous quarter.

Meanwhile, only 15 per cent of those surveyed are more optimistic when it comes to predicting the future of their industry against ten per cent in the previous quarter (MW November 3, 2005).

The IPA says the overall message from the questionnaire, when including marketers’ pessimism, is that financial prospects for respondents’ industries are worse than three months ago.

Companies are cautious, and new budgets for 2006/07, while up on the previous year, have been the most restrained since 2001.