Noting that the global economic rebound in 2010 has run into turbulence in 2011, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has updated its five-year media outlook. As you would expect, most of the revisions were downward – but not all.
“The slower economy is adversely affecting advertising, but by no means uniformly,” PwC analysts wrote in their October update to the “Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2011-2015.” Print media, they noted are the most vulnerable. “Television, radio, out-of-home and cinema are holding up reasonably well while Internet advertising is booming.
PwC compared its April forecast to an October forecast by Zenith and concluded that other forecasters are moving toward PwC’s already conservative numbers, so the PwC analysts are feeling even more confident about their prognostications.
As for the haves and have-nots in media, PwC sees TV as one of the bright spots. “TV viewing and advertising are benefiting from social networking, which is stimulating interest, and live viewing, in shows.” Consumer spending on TV service is mixed, though, with subscriptions down in the US, but still growing in many other countries.
“Social network advertising is growing explosively and fueling the overall Internet advertising market while search advertising is still strong. The US is up more than 20% in the first half of 2011 and the UK is up 12%, in both cases increasing faster than we projected for the year as a whole. Mobile advertising also is strong, boosted by growing penetration of tablets and smart phones. It appears the weakening economy is accelerating the shift of advertising from traditional media to the Internet,” the PwC report stated.
