I’ve been talking for three years about networks and publishers positioning themselves to take advantage of the shift online of audiences from TV and print. When audience’s move, marketing dollars follow. The critical metric used to judge whether the shift in ad budgets is matching the shift in audience attention is ad spend vs. time spent.
Until now, the proportion of time spent online by consumers has been ahead of the percentage of ad budgets devoted to online. In 2011, 22% of total audience time was spent online vs. only 16% of ad budgets. now it’s changed. In just one year, the ratio has shifted to 26% vs 22%.
The relevant slide is shown here. A move of 6% of total ad budgets from offline to online is big news in itself, but I’d argue that the differential in mobile is as important. just 1% of ad budgets are currently devoted to a medium that commands 10% of consumer’s attention. That is what is known in the business as an OPPORTUNITY.
