Web growing so rapidly, future ad spend estimates revised

With online advertising and general web use growing so rapidly, research firms like eMarketer are revising their estimates for ad spends through the year 2014. Years ago when we began researching and analyzing online marketing and communications, projections mainly included Google ad spends and social networks didn’t exist yet.

Today, the tools have advanced for not only web advertisers but web users and we’d like to share with you why we’re all revising our estimates for ad spends over the next few years.

Click to enlarge graph.

The three reasons ad spend estimates are changing at a rapid pace are affordability, mobile web use and social networking becoming mainstream.

Reason one for rising web ad spends: affordability

Affordability has come from the youth of certain ad spend locations as well as a rising supply of places to spend. Just in the last year, we’ve seen a massive increase in ad spends on young sites like Groupon as well as sites like Facebook that offers low ad rates because their sales volume is still low for what it can handle. Throw in Google improving their offering over the last two years and even pay per click with Google is reasonable with targeted campaigns.

Reason two for rising web ad spends: mobile

According to Nielsen, people watching video on a mobile phone has risen nearly 44% in this year alone. Watching video is considered a much more advanced act than opening a web browser or texting, so the rise in advanced behaviors is a direct indicator in a rise of understanding of the technologies as well as an increase in less advanced use.

Reason three for rising web ad spends: mainstream

It’s not just mobile web that is increasing. Social networks like Twitter and Facebook frequently make news in traditional circles and by now, most Americans at least know what these networks are and a rapidly increasing number are signing on after Hollywood stars picked up these web habits and helped fast track their use. Twitter has given birth to multiple television shows and like SecondLife, Facebook application Farmville uses real currency now. Games and stars have made web apps mainstream and more eyeballs mean more ad dollars.

Why web ad spends are rising for Realtors:

Real estate has a unique opportunity with ad spends because it is low commitment (meaning you don’t have to sign a three year contract and commit to color prints in a magazine), many niche opportunities that are available, low cost compared to traditional marketing and has a low barrier to entry. Some Realtors do well with Google PPC, others cross advertise on local business websites, Groupon and the like while others will put time (aka money) into their Twitter presence. We do not suggest replacing traditional marketing, but testing some web marketing is important for any practitioner’s toolkit.