Online advertising is “medium of choice”, claims research

The internet is becoming the ad medium of choice as advertising increase their spend on online advertising, according to research from the European Interactive Advertising Association.

The research has found that 81% of advertisers have increased their allocated online ad spend over this year, and 82% of those respondents claims that they are moving spend from traditional media. It shows that 40% of the increased spend was moved from print and 39% from TV.

The findings are part of the EIAA Marketers’ Internet Ad Barometer. It found that over three quarters (77%) of those questioned found online advertising to have a positive impact on the perception of their brand as well as overall brand awareness (68%).

Alison Fennah, executive director of the EIAA, says: “This research shows that while other forms of media are suffering from slowing spend, online continues to take a growing proportion of advertising budgets as brands increasingly recognise its impact, value and potential ROI.”

She adds that it also shows that advertisers are starting to realise that online can also be used for pan-regional campaigns.

Meanwhile, the research comes as investment bank Jefferies & Co also publishes a report suggesting that online spend will grow at a slower rate over 2008 and 2009.

It says that the search engine marketing will continue to see strong growth, and will boost the medium overall, but the display ad sector will slow. It predicts that Google will expand at a slower rate over the second half of this year compared to the first.