Online ad spending in U.K. up 4.2% in 2009: IAB

The Internet Advertising Bureau came out with its online advertising spending numbers for 2009 in the U.K. today, which registered a 4.2% year-over-year growth for the year. The U.S. numbers come out next week, and this could be a forecast for here in the U.S.

This isn't a surprise, because even though the economy caused budgets to go down, many marketers shifted their money online from more traditional channels because it's cheaper and measurable, and consumers are spending more time online.

The report found that overall display ad spend dropped 4.4% during the course of the year. However, interestingly video ads saw a huge growth, with advertisers spending 140% more on the channel in 2009 than they did in 2008. I'm guessing that we might not be quite there yet in the U.S., but perhaps this year we will be, as more marketers are developing rich media video ads online. As many of these videos will be served within banner ads, this may bleed over into display spend.