European Online Marketing Spend to Hit 16B Euros, 2012

Spend on online marketing in Europe will double in the next five years, from around 7.5 billion euros in 2006 to more than 16 billion euros in 2012, according to a new Forrester report, "European Online Marketing Tops €16 Billion In 2012," reports MarketingCharts.

Online marketing - email, and search and display advertising - will account for 18 percent of total media budgets in Europe in five years, according to the projections.

The reason for this shift in spending is that audience and attention are moving online, according to Forrester:

• Some 52 percent of Europeans are regularly online while at home, and 36 percent of online Europeans say that they watch less TV because they're online.
• On average, they spend three hours per week more online than watching TV.

• Consumers' reliance on online services is growing:
  
• 36 percent of online adults have recently downloaded music online, and 20 percent have downloaded games
  
• 35 percent have bid or sold in online auctions

• Trust in many types of advertising is eroding: 67 percent of online consumers say advertisers don't tell the truth in ads.

• 34 percent of online consumers say they don't mind ads if they relate to their interests.
• 40 percent of online consumers trust price-comparison sites.
• 36 percent of online consumers trust online product reviews from other users.