The report says that there is an overall implication of a shift in spend towards internet marketing activity, supported by an upward revision of internet budgets.
It cites that the proportion of companies spending nothing on internet-related activity has fallen from a high of 29% to 27% for the last quarter of the year. The proportion of companies that only spend 1% of their marketing budgets on internet activity has also fallen from 69% in the third quarter of 2002 to 62%.
The Bellwether Report is the quarterly look at advertisers and what say they intend to spend their marketing budgets on in the coming year.
While the figures do not match the optimism of the recent research from online media agency i-level, which said that spend on internet advertising would rise by 46% in 2003, the Bellwether Report does report an increase.
The proportion of companies allocating more than 5% of their marketing budgets to internet activity rose from 10% in the third quarter of 2002 to 15%.
News across the board for the advertising industry, and traditional media adspend, was not so good.
Bruce Haines, group CEO of Leo Burnett and president of the IPA, said: "Continued economic uncertainty, both at home and abroad, together with disappointing consumer spending in quarter four has led many to cut their marketing budgets in an effort to reduce costs.
"This being said, new budget setting for 2003 signals some positive growth, with more than half of those surveyed increasing their marketing budgets in 2003 on 2002 in real terms."
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