• by September 27, 2000

According to Competitive Media Reporting, the first half of 2000 brought strong gains for the ad industry with ad dollars increasing 14.9%, to $47.7 billion.

CMR says ad spending on every media type increased since last year, with the Internet, not surprisingly, registering the largest increase of all.

Ad spending on the web increased by 65% to $1.3 billion, accounting for about 2.7% of all advertising dollars, which puts the medium above outdoor and Sunday magazines in terms of overall dollars. That's considering that at 25.5%, outdoor had a significant percentage increase as its ad dollars hit $1.1 billion.

Network TV is still the largest medium (also registering a large increase), followed by newspapers, magazines, spot TV, cable, national newspapers, syndicated TV, the web, outdoor and Sunday magazines.

These other media vehicles didn't do too badly in the first half of the year, thanks, in part, to the dot-coms. Despite all the talk about a dot-com slowdown, according to CMR, the dot-com advertising category now far surpasses the fast food, soft drinks, telecommunications, and beer categories.

Online and e-commerce advertisers spent just under $2.1 billion in the first half, for an increase of 88%. Magazines continued to attract the most dot-com ad dollars, but network TV had the biggest increase, more than doubling to over $552 million.