Online Advertising Spending to Surpass Print Spending in 2012

According to research conducted by eMarketer, online advertisement spending is going to surpass that of traditional print for the first time ever in 2012. Online advertising grew by 23% during 2011 to $32.03 billion.  It is expected to grow another 23% to $39.5 billion in 2012.  As expected with the growth of online spending, paper spending is seeing a decrease.  Spending on newspapers and magazine advertisements is expected to drop from $36 billion in 2011, to $33.8 billion in 2012. 

Over the next few years we are expected to see this trend continue.  By 2016, marketers are expected to spend $62 billion on online advertisements, while print advertising budgets drop to $32 billion.  Companies are gradually adding to the amount they allocate to social services each year.  By the end of 2011, Facebook averaged about 2.7% of the total online advertising expenditure by marketers. Efficient Frontier estimates that Facebook ad spending will grow to 5% of the overall online marketing budget. Social services such as Google+ and LinkedIn are also expected to see an increase in marketer’s budgeting allotment, but until these services can prove to have the audience and reach that Facebook can deliver, more marketers are going to invest in Facebook advertising.