New Delhi : Marketers in India are spending more on print than on television, according to the latest FICCI-KPMG India Media and Entertainment Report 2014.
Advertising spend on print was higher in 2013 as well, and according to the report, print will remain ahead of television at least till 2018.
In 2013, the total advertising spend across media was Rs 36,250 crore — of which print had the largest share at Rs 16,260 crore followed by television at Rs 13,590 crore. In 2014, the report projects that of the total Rs 41,000 crore advertising spend, print will garner advertising worth Rs 17,900 crore. 2014 has been good for the print medium, because of the spend arising out of the Lok Sabha elections, the FIFA Football World Cup and because of e-commerce companies, which has been print heavy in their advertising. The rise in the medium’s growth could also be attributed to growth in vernacular print publications across the country. Further, government departments and retail players will continue to increase spending in print, the report says.
Sam Balsara, chairman and managing director of Madison World says print overtook television in 2010 and was projected to widen its lead in 2014. “And this is only taking brand advertising into account, excluding classifieds and notices,” says Balsara.
“Whilst television has strong support from the core category of advertisers — FMCG, print has low entry barrier for advertisers and has four to five times more advertisers than TV,” he says.
Even in terms of growth rates, the Pitch Madison report projects that in 2014 print would grow at 17% and television at 15%. Advertising spend in the digital space, will grow 29.5% in 2014, though this is on account of its low base.
Television and print have been getting similar sorts of ad revenues through display advertising, says Nandini Dias, chief executive officer of Lodestar Media. “What is significantly different is the revenue on classifieds. Print gets classified advertising that TV doesn’t which are not captured in this estimation,” she said.
Dias says that in the coming days more advertising is likely to move to digital platforms. “Shifts will come from classified advertising from print, and due to screen-agnostic viewing , advertisers will catch viewers watching content not only on TV screen but laptop and mobile screens. So, both TV and print will lose out to digital platforms,” she added.
The KPMG report, however, suggests that print will be ahead of TV and other mediums even in 2018 when it predicts total advertising spends in the industry to grow to Rs 69,380 crore. Of this, print’s share will be Rs 27,500 crore while that of television will be Rs 25,300 crore.
