Nielsen says ad spending down slightly this year

The nation's advertisers pulled back significantly from newspapers, magazines and banners on Web sites in the first three quarters of the year, though overall ad spending fell only slightly, partly because of strong demand for TV ads during the Olympics and the presidential election.

The Nielsen Co. said in a report Thursday that ad spending totaled $100.5 billion from January through September, down 0.6 percent from the same period in 2007. The nation's 10 largest advertisers cut spending by 4 percent.

The sinking economy this year likely was a big factor, given that overall advertising had increased slightly during 2007.

The media segments attracting the most ads this year included cable TV. The amount that advertisers spent on cable rose 8.4 percent from January through September, compared with last year. Ad spending on network TV was up 0.9 percent — overcoming a 6 percent drop in the first half of the year — thanks to the Beijing Olympics and political ads.

Meanwhile, local newspapers saw an 8.7 percent drop in advertising growth, with local Sunday supplements down 9.9 percent. Ad spending on national newspapers fell by 6.4 percent.

National magazines were down 5.1 percent. Network radio fell by 3.5 percent while graphical online display ads were down 5.6 percent. Nielsen did not include paid search ads in this study.

The auto industry, traditionally among the biggest advertisers, cut back heavily as car companies struggled for their survival. Ford Motor Co. slashed spending by 23 percent to $1.1 billion while Cerberus Capital Management, the owner of Chrysler LLC, dropped spending by 26 percent to $694 million. General Motors Corp. cut ad spending by 4 percent to $1.7 billion, though GM was the second-largest purchaser of advertising, after Procter & Gamble Co.

The top gainer was direct-response advertising — including Proactiv acne medication infomercials by Guthy-Renker and ads by language-tutorial vendor Rosetta Stone — with ad spending up 27 percent to $2.1 billion.

Quick-service restaurants also got more aggressive. They showed an 11 percent increase in ad spending to $3.3 billion. Wendy's/Arby's Group Inc. and Jack-in-the-Box Inc. each raised spending by about 30 percent in the nine-month period to $127 million and $85.5 million, respectively. The biggest spender in this category was Yum! Brands Inc., the owner of KFC and Taco Bell, which upped ad spending by 10 percent to $698 million.

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