Peter Cornelius, Managing Director, Australia Media, The Nielsen Company

Our latest Top Media Advertisers report delivers a positive outlook on Australia’s advertising industry, with a strong rebound in ad spending to an estimated $10 billion plus.

As the advertising recovery gained momentum in the first half of 2010, there were substantial year on year increases in activity particularly among the major spending categories that were most impacted by the advertising cutbacks of 2009; including Motor Vehicles (+14%), Finance (+13%), Real estate (+19%), Communications (+12%) and Insurance (+12.8%).

The report contains good news for all 10 main media sectors with most recovering from the dip in advertising revenues during 2009 and building on a stronger revenue base for the year ahead. Overall, advertising spending in 2010 by our estimates increased by almost 10 percent over 2009. In the case of advertising performances across Television in the major Metropolitan and Regional markets, estimated spending lifted to almost $4 billion; representing nearly 40 percent of all Australian media spending.

2011 Outlook

The levels of growth across most of 2010 have certainly slowed in 2011; albeit reflecting that media activity has returned to business as usual pre GFC trends. Recent media reports indicate patchy results across some media, possibly due to the recent devastating floods and cyclone damage, consumer caution over escalating food and energy costs, and concerns over the impact of the Government’s proposed carbon trading levy.

However, our dollar is currently at parity to the U.S. dollar, our commodity export markets have maintained positive economic performances, particularly China and India. All these factors considered, our advertising sector should still maintain solid growth over 2010.

For more, download the Top Media Advertisers Sampler Report: Australia