TV pride in lion’s share of ad dollars and consumers’ media

Joseph O'Halloran ©RapidTVNews | 09-05-2012



The latest survey Nielsen has revealed not only the extent to which TV is maintaining its importance in the lives of Americans but also how well it is still being monetised.

In the third part of its snapshot into TV advertising and audiences, the analyst found that with consumers having more TV choices than ever before, both in terms of how and where they tune in and what they watch, US TV ad spending had risen 4.5% throughout 2011, driving a commensurate appetite among American advertisers to devote the bulk of ad dollars to the medium.

In fact Nielsen calculated that ad spend for TV reached $72 billion in 2011, more than all other ad platforms combined. It also calculated that spending on cable TV has increased steadily over the last few years, up 42% from 2007, with the average TV commercial in 2011 being 28.4 seconds in length.

In a huge signifier for the potential riches that US advertisers could tap from an increasingly important demographic, US Spanish-language cable and network TV saw double digit growth in ad spend, up 24% and 16% respectively, from 2010.

Automotive was the largest category for advertising spend across all media, with $10.2 billion spent by automotive brands in 2011, more than twice as much as the second-largest category—quick-service restaurants. Slugging it on the airwaves as they do almost everywhere they face off, communications giants AT&T and Verizon were the top TV spenders during 2011 for brands AT&T Wireless Web Access ($1.1 billion) and Verizon Wireless Web Access ($702.2 million).

Increasingly, advertisers investigated the new TV platforms for their ad dollars as new dynamics in cross platform video viewing occurred. Nielsen found that for Q4 2011, traditional TV had a monthly audience reach of 284.4 million, a 1.7% dip year on year. This was offset by a 7.1% growth in watching tie shifted TV (113.5 million) and a 4.2% growth in online video and online TV which attracted 147.4 million people.