• by Wayne Friedman , August 12, 2009

Online video advertising will account for just 1.6% of all television's ad spend in 2009, according to a new survey by Internet researcher eMarketer. But this will grow to 5.5% in four years.

With estimates for all TV advertising spending at some $70 billion -- according to media agency Universal McCann, and others -- this means online video ad spend sits at around $1.12 billion.

Internet video also remains a small piece in comparison to overall online advertising spending, eMarketer says -- at around 4.3%, and growing to 11% by 2013.

While the researcher says this may not look like much, Internet video grew 125% in 2008 over 2007. Over the next four years, advertising from Internet video will still see big growth, climbing at an average of 40% per year.

Other video ad measures fall the Internet's way -- at the moment. For example, ad spending per hour is $0.13 for TV video advertisers -- but $0.17 per hour in 2009.

But the eMarketer report also notes that the gap between Internet video advertising spending per hour is narrowing with traditional TV; overall Internet video ad spending is getting cheaper. Next year, it estimates that traditional TV video spending and Internet video spending will be almost the same.

In looking at just premium video, however -- prime-time TV episodes that run online -- other research has showed the cost-per-thousand viewer prices (CPMs) for online can be three to four times the price when compared to buying traditional prime-time TV, especially in targeting key viewer demographic groups.