• Reuters, Tuesday, May 11, 2010 10:48 AM

The two-day conference of the International Advertising Association kicks off in Moscow this evening with some of the world's top advertising and marketing chiefs comparing notes on the limping economy and structural changes in the business, Georgina Prodhan reports. The conference is attracting CEOs of agencies including WPP and Publicis as well as marketing chiefs from the likes of Procter & Gamble and Hewlett-Packard.

Global advertising spending is expected to rise 2.2% this year, driven by online paid search ads, according to ZenithOptimedia. Although first-quarter results have shown improving trends, there is "turbulence in the euro zone," Prodhan points out.

One structural change predates the recession: Organizations have been spending an increasing proportion of their marketing budgets on their own Web sites instead of on external media. Chuck Richard, lead analyst at Outsell, says companies have been spending more than 50% of their online marketing budgets on their own sites for three years now.

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