Fletcher Shows Increase In Online Advertising

Consumer brands are catching up with computing and financial services in the amount of online advertising they use, and more advertisers are online now than ever before. These are the findings of a recent survey carried out by Fletcher Research called The UK Banners Survey.

Computing companies were considered the traditional group which used online services for advertising, but these have recently been caught up with by consumer brands advertising, which in 1998 will account for 14% of all spend.

There are presently 750 online advertisers in the UK, according to Fletcher Research, rising from just 250 from the start of 1998. Many advertisers have begun advertising on the net for the first time in the last six months. Fletcher Research predict that this is potentially due to recognition that the number of web users is set to increase rapidly over the next three years as a result of cheaper access, e.g the bundling of internet access with digital TV.

Neil Bradford, lead author of The UK Banners Survey, commented on the report: “1998 has seen big changes for online advertising. At the beginning of the year, most new campaigns were for new software packages and for more powerful computers. But now new cars, TV services, financial products and even razors are being advertised on the web as part of wider campaigns. The next stage will be for companies to move beyond experimenting with the web once or twice and to use the web as an on-going, integrated part of their marketing activity.”

Fletcher Research: 0171 631 0202