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Companies and brands in the UK have upped their digital spend in the first half of 2012, as smartphones and tablets become ever-more popular, meaning that the same can be said of the types of campaigns and ads that target them to try to aid engagement.
According to the latest report, which has been released by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), the amount UK advertisers had spent on their marketing projects over the last six months had seen an increase of 12.6 per cent.
This means that the total digital marketing spend for the duration of the first half of 2012 has gone up to £2.59 billion. This was an increase of £294 million from the £2.3 billion that the same report said was the case in the first six months of 2011.
It was reported in June of this year that the volume of people in the UK who now own a smartphone amounts to 58 per cent of the population, and this statistic saw the amount that brands are spending on mobile based campaigns driven up through this six-month period.
Overall, during the period, the amount of money that marketers were putting into their mobile campaigns was on the increase by 132 per cent to £181.5 million. This now means that mobile is starting to make significant inroads into the marketing campaigns of most organisations, and now accounts for seven per cent of all adspend in the UK.
Tim Elkington, director of research & strategy at the IAB, said: “Almost 60 per cent of people in the UK have a smartphone, average UK household broadband speed is now 9MB and social media accounts for one fifth of all internet time. As digital technology and services evolve to make consumers’ lives easier, more connected and more fun, it’s no surprise that advertisers are coming to the digital party with bigger budgets, despite the challenging economic times elsewhere.
“However, there’s still plenty of room for growth. Take mobile; 60 per cent of the UK’s 100 biggest advertisers still don’t have a mobile-optimised website yet consumers spend almost 70 per cent longer on sites which are. If all advertisers get wise to this, we’re likely to see significant mobile growth for some time yet.”
The biggest chunk of digital adspend however, still sits with paid for searches online, with these still commanding 59 per cent of the average budget at a brand. It also saw a year-on-year increase in spending in the first half of the year.
However, while paid for searches take up most of the digital marketing spend for firms, the report also revealed that videos are becoming ever-more popular for brands looking to get in touch and engage with their clients and customer base.
According to the IAB, digital videos increased by 43 per cent to go from £69.8 million from £49.0 million. They also account for 12 per cent of the overall marketing spend across the UK as a whole.
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