Online advertising spend in 2012 surpasses newspaper ad spend

Report on the online advertising spend - AdEx Benchmark 2012, which is published once a year by IAB Europe, has confirmed that 2012 was extremely successful year for this industry, given that the online advertising spend has overtaken newspaper ad spend for the first time ever.

The AdEx Benchmark 2012 survey - a definitive guide to the state of the European online advertising market - has been published by IAB Europe in association with IHS. The report found that, in 2012, online advertising achieved an overall growth of 11.5% despite what the report called the toughest economic climate for the broader advertising market since 2009.

Online advertising spend managed to surpass newspaper advertising investment for the first time, thus becoming the second biggest media category in Europe.

Internet as a media category has more than doubled its share in the media advertising spend since 2006, when the first AdEx Benchmark survey was released. Today its share accounts for €24.3bn of total advertising spend compared with a newspaper spend of €19.3bn.

Overall, our sector has kept a strong position - IAB Europe CEO Kimon Zorbas said and added: “Growth has continued at an impressive rate especially when compared with the overall economy. Even more remarkable is the increase in Central and Eastern European markets, which indicates their exciting potential.”

In addition, the report found that mobile display advertising grew by 78.3% equating to 5% (€392m) of all online display advertising spend in Europe.