The online advertising sector in South Africa posted impressive growth figures of 136,7% for 2004, making it one of the fastest-growing marketing mediums, according to figures released by the South African Online Publishers Association (OPA) and Nielsen Media Research/AIS AdEx.
The figures show that the South African online advertising industry was worth R116-million for 2004, meaning that the sector is beginning to grow its share of local advertising spend, which still lags behind other mediums at just under 1% of the total market. These new figures represent a more-than-tenfold increase over growth figures for the previous year.
It is cautioned, however, that although the new figures are evidence of healthy organic growth within the industry, the growth is also partly due to additional online publishers reporting their advertising figures.
OPA chairperson Russell Hanly says the South African online advertising industry is now starting to reflect growth trends seen in the United States, Asia and Europe.
“Online advertising in South Africa took a massive leap forward last year and is now starting to reflect the growth trends which have been experienced in many other markets over the past few years. The medium is clearly delivering in terms of efficiency and return on investment, and the sustained presence of a number of advertisers is testimony to this,” he says.
Hanly says the figures point to evidence of a turnaround for the online advertising industry after a tough few years of negative growth during the “dot.bomb era”, when the medium had posted a decline of 15,94% in 2002 and a negligible increase of 8,96% in 2003.
He says another contributing factor is the wider choice of online advertising formats, which allow advertisers to broaden their use of the medium from that of a lead generator to an environment in which to build their brands.
The best-performing sectors in online advertising were banking, business-to-business and travel, transport and leisure.
“The members of the OPA are to be congratulated on this outstanding performance and all credit to those advertisers who boldly supported a medium which is now one of the fastest-growing media categories in South Africa,” says Hanly.
The members of OPA are: 365 Digital Publishing, 5fm, Ananzi, BDFM Publishers, Business in Africa, CareerJunction, CreamerMedia, iafrica.com, Independent Online, ITWeb Limited, JHBLive, Johnnic Communications, Mail & Guardian Online (M&G Media Ltd), Moneymax, M-Web, Media24, Moneyweb Holdings, Ramsay, Son & Parker, SABCnews.com, Supersport Zone, Tiscali, Private Property and Biz-community.com.