Marketers continue to move advertising budgets online, but two separate studies released Monday -- one from Interactive Advertising Bureau and the other from audience marketing company Bizo -- provide
conflicting evidence on where ad dollars will go.
Video will play a key role, according to the IAB study of about 400 industry executives. Sixty-nine percent of marketers and 55% of agencies
plan to increase digital video advertising, up 22% in the next 12 months. Those surveyed expect to spend 17% of their total online display advertising budget in the next year, shifting budgets from
television to online.
Some 62% of marketers will migrate TV ad dollars to digital video, based on the belief that the medium delivers a more positive ROI, compared with 47% of agencies as they
attempt to follow their target audience. Still, high expectations for better targeting, reach and cost continue to hinder adoption of digital video advertising. Companies say the industry needs better
ROI measurement and standardization metrics. Seventy-two percent of companies surveyed said more proof that ad campaigns actually ran might push them to spend more money on digital video ads.
Apparently, 35% said digital video advertising is not easy to buy. Forty-one percent said they would rather buy digital video advertising up front compared with real-time, and that not having digital
video up front limits digital video spending. Thirty-five percent said consumers don't really engage with digital video ads.
So what do consumers and business executives engage with? At least
for business executives, display advertising took top priority in online mediums this year, followed by mobile and search, according to Bizo's online survey conducted the week of March 25.
Nearly half -- 48.8% -- of marketers participating in Bizo's survey said this year they will allocate more of their marketing budget to display advertising. Marketers -- at 22.6% -- said they plan to
spend the same as last year, 17.9% don't know, 7.1% will spend less than last year, and 3.6% don't use display advertising.
Site traffic, at 52.9%, is followed by desired actions, at 45.7% --
and qualified leads, at 38.6%, were noted as being the biggest benefits for adding or increasing the use of display ads. Consumers may begin their search for products and services on search engines,
but they return to Google, Yahoo and Bing looking for more information after viewing a display ad on a publisher's Web site.
Half of the respondents said display advertising will have the
same importance this year as last; nearly 40% said it will become more important; 7% were not sure; and 3.6% said it will be less important.