WebProNews

Worldwide online advertising will grow 10 percent this year, accounting for 15.1 percent of global ad spending by 2011, according to a new report from ZenithOptimedia Group.

The report said online advertising has performed better than what was forecast three months ago due to its transparency, accountability and flexibility. Online advertising is the only category forecast for growth in 2009.

ZenithOptimedia predicts online ad spending will reach $56.8 billion this year, accounting for 12.6 percent of the global advertising market.

"By 2011 we expect it to account for 15.1% of all ad expenditures, up from 10.5% in 2008," the report predicts.

"Most of this growth will come from paid search, which is an ideal method of reaching consumers looking for bargains. In the U.S., we predict search advertising to grow 20.0% in 2009, while traditional display grows 3.0% and classified grows just 1.8%."

The report said some of the growth in the U.S. search advertising marketplace was due to the launch of Microsoft's new Bing search engine, which has led to "welcome competition to Google and should spur further innovation in search."

Overall ad spending is forecast to decrease 8.5 percent this year, down from an April forecast of a 6.9 percent decline.

The report said newspaper ad spending would continue to decline from its 2007 peak of  $131 billion globally.

"We predict newspaper ad expenditure to shrink 14.7% in 2009 and to continue shrinking for the rest of our forecast period. In 2011 we forecast newspaper ad expenditure will total US$101 billion, 22.7% below its 2007 peak," the agency said.