TRENDS<
With online adspend across Europe seeing huge growth, the digital age has truly arrived, IAB Europe’s CEO and president, Alain Heureux tells Grainne Rothery
T ‘
hat online advertising expenditure across Europe showed double-digit in the first half of 2010 suggests that a tipping point has been reached, according to IAB Europe’s CEO and president, Alain Heureux. This growth, he believes, has been driven by advertis- ers very clearly shifting their budgets to digital from other areas like radio, television, newspapers and outdoor. “And that gives us a very strong impetus,” he says. “Because if after six months we see 10, 15 or 20pc growth, then we don’t see why we won’t end up the year at the same level or even higher. The year-end is gener- ally quite positive and strong in digital. “That means the market share of digital will have sig- nificantly grown in 2010 and that the shift will have been made. Based on that, we will probably be in the top two, top three of major places that advertisers invest in most of the markets. “Within all of these locations and decisions, digital seems to have taken an important place. That’s great, because that’s the point where you need to get as an industry, because then you know that you will probably always get your fair share of the overall budget. We will hopefully become a bit more centric, like we were for many years TV-centric and many things were built around the TV story.” Before the publication of the latest figures, there was big interest in how the sector would hold up, he contin- ues. “If you look back, we had fabulous years – 40pc growth in 2007, 20pc growth in 2008 and 4.5pc in 2009. Everyone understands the economic crisis and reces- sion hits everybody and television, radio, newspapers and outdoor were hit hardest. But we were wondering what would be the effect for digital – would it also crash and have difficult times?” In fact, the growth rates in those IAB markets that
report audited online adspend for the first six months of 2010 were: Spain – 20pc; Poland – 18pc; Italy – 15pc;
Hungary – 11pc; UK – 10pc; France – 10pc; Bulgaria – 10pc; and Romania – 8pc. “Having double-digit growth is great for us because it really shows that in some mar- kets like Spain and Poland you can grow up to 20pc/18pc, and even in mature markets like the UK or Scandinavia they seem to be at the 10pc level.” Interestingly, Heureux attributes much of the growth in
Spain’s digital spend to football. “The World Cup had a big impact on digital in Spain, with many advertisers investing in this space, which means they believe and understand now that brand advertising and brand awareness can be developed on digital activities.” One example he cites is brewer AB InBev, which has said that, having invested 95pc of its World Cup adver- tising budget in TV four years ago, it reduced this to 25pc for World Cup 2010, with nearly 70pc moving to digital. “It was not only digital media space, meaning banners and so on, it was a mixture,” says Heureux. “It was a digital story in the centre with a community web- site linking consumers and supporters with their best players. They were able to connect, chat and link them- selves with these big players. Around that was built an entire, digital-centric story ending up with some TV. But it started from the core being digital.” He points out that this is a complete shift from the classic way of promoting a beer brand, which would nor- mally have involved men, television, pubs and football. “Making it suddenly digital-centric and building stories around community platforms is very impressive.” While certain sectors have embraced digital quite
readily, FMCG brands have generally been slow on the uptake, says Heureux. “Typically, our first and earlier adopters were the banks, cars and the travel industry, which have been quite digital-oriented for the last three or four years and some of them very impressively, with 30, 40, 50pc of their activities going online and on digi- tal. Competitors were looking at what each other was
The World Cup had a big impact on digital in Spain, with many advertisers investing in this space, which means they believe and understand now that brand advertising and brand awareness can be developed on digital activities’
Volume 4 Issue 4 2010 Marketing Age 29
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