National newspapers saw a 19.2% drop in advertising spend in printed products in Q2 this year to £239m, according to the latest figures by the Advertising Association and Warc (AA/Warc).
They saw a rise of 5.9% to £51m in digital adspend was up in the first half of 2015, so altogether the sector recorded a drop of 11.3% for the first half of 2015. AA/Warc predicts a decline of 7.7% over 2015 as a whole. ?
Regional newsbrands fared rather better, recording a decline of 7.2% in adspend in Q2 2015 compared with last year. Regional papers saw a 12.1% drop in print advertising (to £246m) but a 24% increase for digital revenues (to £55m). The sector is expected to decline 4.2% overall this year.
Magazine adspend dipped 6.8% in Q2, comprising an 11% decline for print (to £168m) and a 5.2% uptick for digital (to £70m). Overall, ad revenues fell 5.4% during H1. Total adspend is predicted to decline by 5% this year. ?
OOH adspend also dropped in Q2, by 3.6% to £249m but this followed strong year-on-year growth of 9.7% in Q1.
Overall in the first half of the year OOH sector saw a 2.3% growth in adspend in the first six months of 2015. AA/Warc predicts a rise of 3.8% for the year as a whole, with the Rugby World Cup providing a boost in Q3. ?
Direct mail was another print winner. There was growth in this sector of 5.9% in Q1 and a year-on-year increase in Q2 of 3.1% to £476m, making sector growth of 4.5% over the first six months. AA/Warc predicts direct mail to see average growth of 2.9% across the year.?
Chief executive direct response media agency MC&C and chair of the Direct Marketing Association’s advertising mail committee Mike Colling said he thought the OOH growth was a blip, with the long-term value in OOH being in digital but the direct mail results were really interesting.
“We’ve now seen three consecutive quarters of growth. Direct mail has been written off but I think that within mail that growth can be sustained.”
Colling said there were three key changes that had turned the fortunes of direct mail around.
The first is the availability of insights and evidence into people’s mail habits. Colling praised Royal Mail MarketReach for the research it has commissioned.
“For the first time mail is on a level playing field with TV and radio. There have been studies before but not at that level or that robustness.”
In addition “Royal Mail is now behaving like a modern media owner” with “a targeted approach to clients across the whole marketplace,” Colling added.
A “united value chain all pulling together” was the third factor, he said.
AA/Warc also estimates full year growth of 7.1% in TV. 5.1% in cinema and 12.8% in internet. Mobile accounted for 79% of total internet growth during H1, with adspend of just over £1bn (up 52.1%). Full-year growth in mobile adspend is forecast at 47.2%.
In total ?UK advertising expenditure grew 5.8% to reach a record high of £9.4bn in the first half of 2015.
Chief executive at the Advertising Association Tim Lefroy, said advertising’s resilience points to the strength of the broader economy in the first half of 2015.
Advertising spend is predicted to break the £20bn barrier in 2016, with a 5.8% rise in 2015 and a 5.3% rise in 2016.
