For a recent speaking engagement, I ventured a little outside my comfort zone to discuss some broader trends in display and online advertising. Mobile, normally my area of focus, is contributing to the overall growth in display, thanks in part to the buzz generated by Apple's iAd and Google-AdMob. But it is still more of a sideshow than the main event.
With a heavy debt of gratitude to my eMarketer colleague David Hallerman, who did much of the heavy lifting in coming up with forecasts for online ad spending, here are 10 key trends to watch:
A spending turnaround
First, the good news: After a dismal year in 2009, online advertising is bouncing back in 2010. According to eMarketer calculations, online advertising spending contracted by 3.4 percent in 2009, and total ad spending dropped even further, falling 15 percent. Thankfully, the downward trend is reversing, and online advertising is forecast to grow by close to 11 percent in 2010.
An increasingly attractive channel
The internet's share of total media spending will continue to rise, from 15 percent in 2010 to 20 percent in 2014. Overall, an additional $11 billion will flow into the online advertising space between 2010 and 2014, which points to the internet's increasingly central place in the media universe. The influx of spending also reflects the fact that online is where marketers now find their audiences. Plus, they benefit from more precise targeting and better measurement than they typically find with other media.
Moreover, in a weaker, albeit slowly improving economy, there is a greater drive to prove ROI, so the quest for greater accountability likewise drives more marketers to the web. The internet is still far from perfect when it comes to accountability, but it often enables marketers to make a stronger ROI case than other channels. Together, these forces help cement the place of new ad formats and ad models within the broader media universe.
In addition, as more ad campaigns go across media, there are increasing indications that the internet gets a greater share of ad dollars. With brand marketers increasingly moving in the direction of integrated campaigns, this too, will benefit online ad spending.
Display growth
Display -- banners, rich media, and video -- remains a bright spot within the online ad ecosystem. According to eMarketer predictions, growth in display advertising will outpace total online ad spending through 2014. And as noted, new (or reconfigured) entrants in the mobile space, led by Google and Apple, will drive more brand marketers to adopt mobile or expand what were previously small experiments with the channel.
Video and rich media boom
Video will become the third-largest online ad format by 2014. It ranks third from the bottom today, above sponsorships and email, but it is poised for significant growth. Why? For the simple reason that marketers, particularly those looking to replicate the emotional response they generate with TV ads, are learning they can get their message across online more effectively with video. And they can do so with better measurability and ability to target ads than on TV. By 2014, eMarketer estimates that video will account for 15 percent of total online ad spending, and nearly 9 percent of total TV ad spending.
Spending on banners remains steady, and in many ways, banners remain the foundation of online display campaigns, but as more online consumers ignore banners, marketers will feel compelled to use more intrusive formats, which points the way toward increased use of bigger and richer banners as well as emerging ad formats such as video.
Diversification
The web and, consequently, display ad placements are diversifying. Marketers continue to favor the big portals, such as Yahoo and AOL, but display is growing faster than these traditional recipients of display ad dollars. And this suggests more money is being distributed across an increasing universe of sites, including large social networks such as Facebook.
DSPs
At the same time that marketers are expanding their display placements across this growing web, demand-side platforms (DSPs) are helping to consolidate media buying. The large number of recent iMedia columns devoted to DSPs, including "DSPs demystified," "Demand-side-platform myth busters," and "A quick guide to demand-side platforms," tells you what a hot topic it is in online advertising circles.
In some ways, the emphasis on DSPs makes perfect sense: As media buys get more complex and as there are more sites and inventory to manage, marketers need tools to streamline and manage this growth. Marketers are flocking to DSPs because they deliver scale and efficiency, accurate and appropriate ad placements, and most of all, DSPs inject the kind of transparency that marketers demand, all wrapped in a self-service interface.
Going local
Local advertising is increasingly moving online, as both marketer needs -- to find and connect with consumers -- and more sophisticated geo-targeting come together. Mobile will play a key role here, too, as the nexus between mobile, social, and local becomes tighter. Mobile devices play a growing role in steering consumers toward local retailers (through, for example, progressively sophisticated search applications and social commerce platforms) and serving as the delivery mechanism for targeted offers.
Other spending increases
Even as online advertising, and display in particular, show healthy growth rates, more marketing dollars are going to non-media spending. This is a secular trend affecting not only online but marketing spending as a whole. As marketers look to engage their audience with relevant, trustworthy messages, they are spending more on things such as improving their brand's website or building dedicated microsites. Many marketers are spending more on social media initiatives and mobile applications that help them better reach and engage their audience.
Emphasis on branding
Tied into this shift away from traditional forms of media advertising is an increased emphasis on branding. eMarketer projects that a growing portion of total online advertising dollars will shift from campaigns with direct response objectives to those with branding goals over the next five years. This likewise explains the healthy outlook for display advertising and for video in particular. Video is the ad format that has the greatest potential impact for delivering the kinds of rich messaging to which marketers have grown accustomed with traditional media such as TV.
Safety and privacy issues
The emphasis on branding means that the industry must tackle brand safety and privacy issues head on. In a recent Winterberry Group survey, potential for reputational damage ranked as the leading inhibitor to display advertising spending. In the same survey, more than 60 percent of advertising professionals polled said their display spending would grow by 10 percent or more if brand safety concerns were adequately addressed.
Although it's not all roses, the trends in online advertising are largely positive, especially after such a difficult year in 2009. One key to realizing this promising future is ensuring that the whole marketers put together (i.e., the campaign) adds up to more than the sum of its parts.
Noah Elkin is a senior analyst at eMarketer, where he covers trends in mobile marketing, content, and commerce.
On Twitter? Follow Elkin at @noahelkin. Follow iMedia Connection at @iMediaTweet.
