MagnaGlobal has released its updated 2011 US Media Owners Advertising Revenue Forecast, which remains unchanged at 1.6% growth, including the impact of political and Olympics (P&O) advertising. Magna still expects media suppliers to generate $173.5 billion of ad revenues in 2011. However, due to persistent weakness in the US economy, the 2012 growth forecast has been revised down from 4.8% to 2.9%–including P&O. A slowdown in real personal consumption expenditures, manufacturing activity, and ongoing problems in the labor and housing markets all contribute to the revised outlook.
Excluding direct marketing components, the revenue growth of core media categories is estimated at 2.9% in 2011 and 4.3% in 2012.
For the Local Mass Media category (local Radio, local TV, local Newspapers and Outdoor media), declines are expected through the second half of 2011 and into 2012. They now expect this segment to decline -1.1% in 2011 and -0.4% in 2012, driven primarily by weakness in Newspapers (-5.5%), while Radio will be flat (-0.4%), and Outdoor should grow 4.2% in 2011 and 4.5% in 2012.
TV will be the fastest growing medium after Online in 2012, with ad revenues increasing 7.1% compared with Online’s 11.6%. Magna believes the 2012 Elections and the Summer Olympics will generate incremental revenue of $3.1 billion for television: $2.5 billion in political advertising (the highest spending ever, mostly on local broadcast television) and $633 million around the London Olympics (up 5.5% compared with Beijing 2008, and primarily fuelling National Broadcast TV revenues).
Under the current expectations of a slow-but-positive economic recovery in 2012, media suppliers’ advertising revenues will continue to recover from the severe recession of 2008-2009. MagnaGlobal expects revenues to reach $178.5 billion in 2012, which is still significantly less than the pre-recession level of 2007 ($206.1 billion).
Direct Media is exhibiting an increasing discrepancy between traditional activities (Directories and Direct Mail) and digital (Internet Yellow Pages, Paid Search, Lead Generation). Traditional direct media remains significant ($26.2 billion in 2011), but it is increasingly challenged by digital alternatives. Digital direct media, on the other hand, continues to outperform. Paid Search growth has accelerated this year to 21.7%, and is expected to maintain double-digit growth in 2012 (13.0%). Recent algorithm improvements have helped accelerate cost-per-click trends and have led brands to rely more heavily on search engine marketing and search engine optimization. So, for 2011, they now expect $31.1 billion in total online ad spend, up 19.5% vs. 2010.
