Major Ad Spenders Moving 20% of Budget to Online Media

A new AAF study (that I haven't been to able to get a hold of yet) says that major ad spenders are in the process of moving up to 20% of their total ad budget to online media. If true, that is a huge shift, up from 4-8% at present.

The reason? The usual suspects: performance, measurability, targeting, immediacy, and so on. At the core though, there is no escaping the ad changes the web is pushing:

Mike Kelly, president, AOL Media Networks, said the immediacy of the statistics that can be generated from web traffic are creating demands for similar accountability throughout the media industry. "The ability to measure advertising is irresistible," he said.

While some view online ads as a zero-sum game -- online gains represent offline losses -- I generally take the view that online advertising is shifting dollars from other media, as well as helping grow the offline advertising pie (at least a little). Looking backwards, that has been the case in other periods too, like when TV hit the mainstream:

Every other consumer medium lost share from 1950 to 1960, yet every medium still managed to gain revenue during that booming decade. Even radio, most threatened by TV, managed a small gain.

While I'm not convinced the effect will be as pronounced this time, I think we'll still see a general spend expansion.

[via AdAge]