Global internet adspend will grow 13% to reach US$205bn this year, according to new forecasts from Zenith – with UK adspend set to surpass £17.5bn.
Globally, ‘internet advertising’ – which Zenith defines as any advertising delivered over the internet to a browser or app, on desktop and mobile devices – will attract 36.9% of all advertising expenditure, up from 34% in 2016.
2017 will also mark the first year in which more money will be spent on internet advertising than advertising on traditional television (which will total US$192bn), Zenith said.
However, the scale of internet advertising means its growth rate is slowing, Zenith said. Internet adspend grew 17% in 2016, down from 20% in 2015, and Zenith expects growth to slow to 13% in 2017, 12% in 2018 and 10% by 2019.
The latest forecasts also reveal that social media is set to overtake print newspaper advertising by 2019.
Zenith has forecast that within two years social media adspend will reach US$55bn, overtaking spend on printed newspapers (but not digital editions), which will total US$50bn.
The news comes as online advertising faces a new wave of scrutiny as issues such as poor viewability, brand safety and ad fraud dominate headlines.
The predicted growth in social media adspend also coincides with a new ad effectiveness study by Peter Field that shows campaigns using newsbrands are 43% more likely to deliver very large market share growth, 36% more likely to deliver profit and 85% more likely to drive customer acquisition.
Additionally, activity in newsbrands is more than twice as likely to both deliver a reduction in price sensitivity and an increase in customer loyalty.
Meanwhile, social media advertising – despite ongoing criticisms – is the fastest-growing component of internet advertising – it grew 51% in 2016, and Zenith forecasts it to grow at an average rate of 20% a year to 2019.
Newspaper advertising, meanwhile, is shrinking by 5% a year as circulations continue to fall. Print newspaper adspend has shrunk every year since peaking at US$113bn in 2007, and by 2019 will be back to levels last seen in 1985 – without adjusting for inflation.
