Survey States Not Enough Money is Being Spent on Digital Marketing

Not enough money is being spent on digital marketing – that’s the long and short of it. According to Marin Software’s second annual Digital Marketing Managers’ Census, 49% of all UK adult media consumption is via digital channels; however, only 46% of UK ad spend is utilised for digital.

The good news is, 61% of respondents recognised that money needs to be shifted from offline to online marketing efforts. But will they do this? And if so, which areas of digital are they likely to invest in?

Mobile Marketing – The census reveals, 25% of all UK media consumption is by mobile devices, but only 10% of ad spend is specifically targeted at mobile users. Whereas statistics from Ofcom have revealed that two thirds of people now own a smartphone and use it for nearly 2 hours every day to browse the internet or use social apps.

The number of smartphone users is expected to surpass 2 billion in 2016 and is likely to continue to grow further over the next few years, meaning mobile marketing has some catching up to do. Mobile marketing is certainly an area worth utilising budget spend.

Education – The census also reveals that 39% of managers feel senior marketers don’t fully understand digital. This clearly shows that money must be spent educating senior marketers on their digital options, which in turn, may result in an increased digital spend due to a deeper understanding.

Here at Liberty Marketing we recognise the need for digital education and we share our years of expert knowledge in many ways. We educate digital marketers of the future about the industry and we help our clients broaden their knowledge through consultancy services, training days, as well as talking at multiple industry events each year.

Social Media – For years, social media marketing has been seen as the cheap and easy way for SMEs to get their business seen by perspective customers; however, thanks to recent rumours, we think investment in social media advertising will be more effective than ever in 2016.

Why? Well, in early 2015, Twitter made comments or ‘quotes’ possible, and the latest rumours claim that the popular social networking site is getting rid of its 140 character limit soon. This will come as no surprise as they have already lifted the limit on their direct messaging tool.

If this does happen, Twitter will quickly become an ideal content publishing platform. With its already existing advanced user search function to target customers, this content can be created and pushed with a higher forecasted response rate.

Visual Content – Content with images, videos or gifs is always going to be more effective than text only copy. It’s more engaging and can hold a reader’s attention for longer. Plus, if you use social media for content distribution, photo tweets are 94% more likely to be shared than text based ones.

As a result, ‘by 2017, video will account for 69% of all consumer internet traffic’ states The Guardian; user generated content and quality visuals will also see investment.

Would you like to learn more about digital marketing and which avenues will be most effective for your business? Then speak to us today! Want to learn more? Read about our wide range of consultancy services and digital marketing services to find out how we can help drive your business forward.