• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, December 13, 2006

So far, it's been a good year. Growth in the Internet and Spanish-language TV spending and an election-fueled spot TV market led to a 5.1% growth in U.S. ad spending over the first nine months of 2006, according to Nielsen Monitor-Plus.

Internet spending continued its seemingly inexorable rise--jumping 49.2%, with Spanish-language TV increasing 16.6%. Spot TV in the top-100 markets, where candidates in tough races flooded the airwaves, jumped 7.4%. (Year-end figures should rise even more when results for the final three months, which includes the weeks leading up to the November election, come in.)

Also enjoying a solid year is the national newspaper category, in which spending in the first three quarters rose 8.4%.

The Monitor-Plus data was more bullish than the projections that TNS Media Intelligence released last week for the first three quarters. TNS said spending was up 4%. TNS figures did show healthy growth in the Internet and Spanish-language TV areas.

Monitor-Plus also said Tuesday that the nation's top 10 advertisers spent a collective $12.9 billion--a 4.3% jump over the first nine months of 2005.

The two marketers with the greatest spending jumps came in the booming telecom category: AT&T up 47.7% and Verizon increasing 24.9%. AT&T's increase was propelled by a major campaign to reintroduce itself after a merger with SBC. The company should provide a redux next year, as it seeks to introduce itself again after a merger with BellSouth.

While telecom saw increases, the auto category posted softness, with GM decreasing spending 15% and DaimlerChrysler down 3.6%.

Monitor-Plus also reported that marketers continue to warm to product placement as a tactic, with the top-10 brands in the arena making "brand occurrences" 9,181 times in the first nine months. Coca-Cola led the way, with more than one-third of them--3,314--mostly due to its prime slot in "American Idol."