US online advertising revenues reached almost $5.9 billion for the third quarter of 2008, up 11% compared with the same period last year, according to The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
The IAB Internet Advertising Revenue Report also shows that the Q3 2008 figures are 2% higher than the Q2 2008 results, and are the second-highest quarterly results ever, despite the current US economic situation.
According the IAB, revenues totaled $17.3 billion in the first nine months of this year, up from $15.2 billion in the same period last year and surpassing the record set in the first nine months of 2007 by nearly 14%.
“The growth of interactive advertising that we’ve been experiencing over the past few years has stabilised due in large part to the difficult current economic climate,” said Randall Rothenberg, president and CEO of the IAB.
“Interactive advertising continues to be the most measurable and cost-effective way to reach consumers, and we see more and more marketers seeking to harness its power,” he added.
David Silverman, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, said: “A weakening economy will continue to be a challenge to all forms of advertising-supported media. However, the internet should be better poised to withstand the storm given its ability to combine performance-based advertising along with broad-based branding.”
In October, the IAB’s report found that US internet advertising revenues for the first six months of 2008 were $11.5 billion, setting another new half-year record representing a 15.2% increase over the first half of 2007.
The report also revealed search revenues totaled almost $5.1 billion for the first six months of 2008, up 24% from the $4.1 billion for the same period in 2007(see US Internet Ad Revenues Up 15.2%).
According to findings from the online publishing service provider, PubMatic, US online ad prices have declined by 27% this year (see US Online Ad Prices Decline).
Display advertising pricing has generally trended downwards across website sizes and verticals throughout the year, said PubMatic.
Rajeev Goel, president and co-founder of PubMatic, said: “Online advertising is one of the key indicators in the US economy, as marketing spend is typically one of the early cuts when realigning corporate expenses. We’ve observed this effect for the past three quarters and it is reflected in the pricing for all US publishers.
“Even though declining budgets are a concern, the measurability of the Internet shouldn’t be discounted. This overall downward trend in the economy may be a call to marketers to segment more of their budgets to methods and tactics that allow them to better measure ROI.”
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