Thursday, September 24, 2009

Internet Surpasses Newspapers in Gobbling Up the Decreasing DTC Ad Spending Pie!

It was the best of times [for the Internet], it was the worst of times [for newspapers].

For the first time that I can remember, the pharmaceutical industry is spending more of its DTC advertising budget on Internet display ads (excluding search) than on newspapers (see chart below; source is TNS Media Intelligence). [We're only talking about Q1 data, 2009 v. 2008.]

DTC Ad Spend Q1 2009 v 2008

Comparing Q1 2009 to Q1 2008, spending on Internet ads increased by 154% (from $21.0 million in Q1 2008 to $53.4 million in Q1 2009). No wonder there are so many new interactive agencies knocking on pharma's doors these days!  That's a dollar increase of $32.3 million. Meanwhile, spending on TV decreased by almost the same amount; ie, $31.4 million.

You could say that pharma took money out of TV to put into the Internet. But don't count TV out just yet.  The percent of the DTC budget devoted to TV actually increased from 62% in Q1 2008 to 66% in 2009. The percent of the budget devoted to Internet display ads in Q1 2009 was 4.8% compared to just 1.7% in Q1 2008!

Overall, there was a 9.7% decrease in DTC spending in Q1 2009 copared to Q1 2008.

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous10:23 PM

    So your ripping off DTC Perspectives who printed this information earlier this week. Funny how you criticize other outlets for "ripping" you off but it's OK for you to reproduce data that is already out there and very old. It's old data dude and that is why TNS has released it for free. Tell us what the current quarter or month look like and maybe someone will see some value in this.

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  2. What am I? A rich pharmaco that can afford to pay for up-to-date data on DTC? I'm not that interested, dude. You need to find some other source for that kind of information.

    Beside, does DTC Perspectives produce such nice charts? I don't think so.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I hate when people post anonymously ...

    ReplyDelete

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