Spending on advertising barely showed a pulse in the third quarter of 2011, growing by just 0.4%, according a report from Kantar Media cited in The New York Times. Spending growth has slowed in each quarter this year — first quarter growth came in at 4.1% and second quarter growth reached 2.8% when compared with the same period a year ago.
The slow third-quarter growth was the result lower spending by top advertisers even as mid-size advertisers spent more. Proctor & Gamble Co. (NYSE: PG), the largest US advertiser, cut spending by 0.7%, as did the second largest spender, AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T). Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) cut ad spending by 11.9% and 11.3%, respectively. Among the top 10 advertisers, only L’Oreal Group and Chrysler spent more on advertising in the third quarter.
Newspapers once more got the worst beating, losing 6.4% of free-standing inserts and 3.7% in the newspaper take itself. Local newspaper advertising fell by 4.4%, while national newspapers saw a decline of 0.3%.
Online search advertising fell by a surprising 14.4%, while online display advertising grew by 15.8%. Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is the leader in search ads, while Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Facebook Inc. lead in display advertising. Overall, internet advertising declined by 2.9% in the third quarter.
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