Social media ads 'justifying hype' as ZenithOptimedia lifts internet forecast

The Publicis Groupe-owned media agency has boosted the forecast it issued in December for 2012 global internet adspend, by 4.5%.

The sudden rise of social is evident in a revision to its US forecasts, which had pegged social media spend for 2012 at $1.33bn (£851m) in December, but now predicts $3.42bn (£2.2bn).

Jonathan Barnard, head of forecasting at ZenithOptimedia, said this was partly due to $1bn (£640m) of display spend being recategorised as social media spend, and partly due to the medium growing faster than previously thought.

Barnard told Media Week: "Social is justifying its hype now. A third of all display impressions in the US are social. Advertisers are learning to be less interruptive."

He added the revised perspective of how much social media was growing and contributing to larger markets had a knock-on effect on the forecast for 2012 overall internet adspend across the world, which is up from $84.3bn (£53.9bn) in December to $88.1bn (£56.3bn). (The agency does not give a breakdown for social media in its global forecast.)

In its review of the US, the agency comments: "Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are all building platforms that are attractive to small businesses, in addition to Fortune 500 companies.

"Social media is creating a new type of advertiser that did not advertise before, including individuals and content creators.

"Social media ads should also be expected to increase in price, based on current patterns, the influx of new advertisers, new creative formats, and improved targeting."

Zenith has also nudged up its forecast for 2012 global adspend growth across all media after turning more optimistic about Latin America, although it downgraded Western Europe.

Follow Daniel Farey-Jones on Twitter @danfareyjones

League Tables

Advertising expenditure by medium (US $ million, current prices)
	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014
Newspapers	94,871	91,742	89,953	88,946	88,480
Magazines	43,643	43,003	42,137	41,741	41,674
Television	176,820	183,681	193,660	203,444	215,298
Radio	32,013	32,884	33,633	34,799	35,828
Cinema	2,319	2,474	2,643	2,848	3,055
Outdoor	29,722	31,315	32,862	34,413	36,108
Internet	65,009	75,748	88,065	102,363	118,943
Total	444,397	460,847	482,983	508,555	539,386

This article was first published on mediaweek.co.uk