• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, May 7, 2007

The world's biggest media buying entities got even bigger during 2006, but still control a relatively minor share of global and U.S. ad spending, according to a MediaDailyNews analysis of new estimates from RECMA. According to revised estimates released last week by the Paris-based media billings research firm, the Big 6 ad agency holding companies - WPP, Publicis, Omnicom, Interpublic, Aegis and Havas - billed a total of $195.06 billion during 2006, an increase of 6.8% over the $182.63 billion they billed during 2005. That's slightly better than the 5.3% growth in worldwide ad spending estimated by Universal McCann forecaster Bob Coen, and means the Big 6 picked up some share of the global ad marketplace, but only slightly.

The six holding companies' share of global ad spending rose just 0.4 point to 32.5%, meaning the world's largest buyers of media control less than a third of the global ad marketplace.

That mirrors a similar pattern in the U.S. advertising marketplace, where the 14 largest media buying shops - both those owned by the Big 6, as well as independent Horizon Media - controlled a combined 31.4% of U.S. media buys, up from 30.8% in 2005.

The data dispels a fundamental myth about the advertising business: That the consolidation of big media buying accounts on Madison Avenue has concentrated the advertising marketplace into a handful of big agency players. While this is arguably true for certain big media like network TV, the reality is that the overall advertising marketplace is more of a long tail made up of lots of smaller advertisers and regional and local ad agencies that control roughly two-thirds of U.S. and global ad spending.

Among Madison Avenue's biggest, there was some modest consolidation at the top, as the biggest agencies' share grew slightly bigger. Starcom MediaVest Group, which RECMA ranks as the world's largest media buying network with $25.58 billion in billings during 2006, increased its share among the world's 12 largest media networks to 13.1% in 2006, up from 11.9% in 2005.

Domestically., MindShare ranked No. 1 among the 14 largest media agencies in the U.S., with $11.3 billion during 2006, according to RECMA. Based on those billings, MindShare boosted its share among the 14 agencies was flat at 12.6%. The biggest share gains in U.S. media billings came from MediaVest (+1.4 points to an 8.1% share) and sister agency Starcom (+0.8 point to 10.7% of the market).

PARENT COMPANY, WORLDWIDE
RANK			Billings (In billions)
2006	2005		2006	2005	Change
1	1	WPP Group	$60.51	$55.51	+9.0%
2	2	Publicis Group	$44.87	$39.60	+13.3%
3	3	Omnicom	$30.52	$28.48	+7.2%
4	4	Interpublic Group	$25.86	$27.13	-4.7%
5	5	Aegis Group	$23.53	$22.85	+3.0%
6	6	Havas	$9.77	$9.06	+7.8%

Source: RECMA