Much has been made of Procter & Gamble's decision to lay off 1,600 advertising staffers because—as many publications reported tongue-in-check—digital advertising is free. Certainly, P&G chairman Robert McDonald’s comments that the company belatedly recognized the cost efficiency of digital marketing did little to paint the company as up on advertising trends or media savvy. However, even companies that are more aware of trends in the industry have been loathe to reevaluate budgets–until now. In many ways, P&G is just part of a larger trend.
McDonald has cited the Old Spice socai media campaign in 2010—again, illustrating its behind-the-times awareness–as a campaign that achieved 1.8 billion in 'free' impressions online. Certainly this campaign made industry annals. According to The Nielson Co., sales of Old Spice Body Wash jumped 55% in the three months after the campaign–a 186-plus viral video extravaganza, in which the actor portraying the Old Spice Man, Isaiah Mustafa, took questions and responded to posts on Twitter, Facebook, Digg and Reddit.
They were produced at roughly a rate of 7 minutes per video.
Email Marketing Still Tops
Despite such outsized social media examples, many companies are also focusing on the basics.
Email marketing (60%) is the program most cited by business leaders for a 2012 increase in spend, according to a December 2011 study conducted by StrongMail in conjunction with Zoomerang. The survey found that more respondents plan to increase their social media budgets (55%) than their mobile or search (SEO/PPC) spend (both at 37%). By contrast, few executives expect to increase their spend on direct mail (18%), tradeshows & events (18%), or public relations (16%).
Digital Ad Focus
Perhaps the best supporting evidence to back P&G’s decision comes from the recently-released third annual Marketing Budgets Report, published by Econsultancy in partnership with Experian Marketing Services.
It found that there is a continued shift of focus to online channels, with more than two-thirds (68%) of companies increasing their digital budgets for 2012. This compares to nearly half (45%) of companies who said they intend to increase their overall marketing budgets and only 16% planning to increase their traditional (offline) marketing budgets.
The research also found:
- Of those companies increasing their digital marketing budgets, 79% will increase them by more than 10%.
- Three-quarters (74%) of companies are increasing their investment in digital marketing technology this year, up from 67% in 2011.
- More than half (56%) of companies are planning to recruit more people into their digital marketing teams in 2012, up from 52% in 2011.
