Nielsen: U.S. Advertising rose 4.6% – Hispanic rose 8.1% in 2006.

Advertising spending for the full year 2006 rose 4.6% over the same period last year due to gains across major media, according to preliminary figures released today by Nielsen Monitor-Plus, the advertising intelligence service of The Nielsen Company.

Advertising spending increased in most reported media, led by Internet (35%), the top 100 Spot TV markets (9.1%), Spanish-Language TV (8.1%) and Outdoor (8.1%). Growth in a number of media remained flat or slightly down over last including B2B magazines, Coupons, smaller Spot TV markets, Network Radio, and Local Newspaper. “Total U.S. ad spending continues to grow, with the Internet, Spanish-Language and Outdoor leading the way,” said Brian Lane, Senior Vice President of Client
Strategy & Product Development Management for Nielsen Monitor-Plus. “Outdoor advertising, considered a traditional media is showing renewed strength due in part to advances in digital technology, such as digital billboards.”

Advertiser Spending

Advertising spending for the top 10 companies of 2006 reached $17.9 billion, remaining essentially flat from 2005, with just 1% growth. Six of the 10 advertisers experienced growth. AT&T and Verizon, both Telephone Services companies, showed the greatest percent growth in terms of percent, at 44.4% and 16.2%, respectively. A portion of this increase is due to merger and acquisition activity, and both companies greatly increased their spending in their Internet Service/Web Access business units.

Offsetting these increases, two of the three automotive advertisers reduced ad spending. Specifically, GM spending was down 16% and DaimlerChrysler decreased its ad spending by 6.1%, while both Ford and Toyota continue to increase spending, and in particular on brands like Toyota Camry and Rav4, Ford Fusion and Mercury Milan.

Johnson & Johnson cut back overall spending on a number of brands including Orthoevra and
Ditropan.

Category Spending

Spending for the 10 largest categories reached $45 billion in 2006, 3% greater than the same period last year. Most product categories have increased spending, with the exception of Credit Card Services (-6.9%), Auto Dealerships (-3.5%), and Automotive, comprised of Factory & Dealer Associations (-1.5%). The Pharmaceutical industry was the fastest growing in terms of percent increase over last year (14.9%) and in terms of actual dollar increase ($719 million). Pfizer increased
spending 32% ($158 million), while Merck and Sepracor each increased their budgets 40%, $118 million and $95 million, respectively.

Product Placement

Nielsen’s Product Placement Service shows a decrease in the overall number of placements for primetime network programming with a total of 79,701 occurrences for 2006 compared to 102,793 occurrences for 2005. While the total number of occurrences is down, placements that combine an audio and visual mention have increased by 10%. In 2006 there were 4,912 audio/visual combination occurrences compared to 4,456 in 2005.

Top Programs & Brands

The Top 10 programs that featured product placements for 2006 accounted for 23,344 occurrences.

General dramas (22,825 occurrences) replaced situation comedies (19,161 occurrences) as the number one program type to feature brand integrations, due to the airing of more episodes for this type of program in 2006. American Idol featured 4,086 product placements, with more occurrences than any other program, a 17% increase over 2005. The Biggest Loser, not on the top ten list last year, ranked 4th with (2,478) occurrences. The Top 10 brands totaled 10,323 occurrences in 2006, a 13% increase. Coca-Cola was the top brand, with 3,355 occurrences, a 19% increase over 2005. Chef Revival Apparel placed second with 1,592 occurrences.

“The total number of occurrences for product placements decreased in 2006, and can be largely attributed to shifts in programming such as the airing of more dramas, which tend to carry less product placements than other program genres,” said Annie Touliatos, Director of Marketing and Strategy for Nielsen Product Placement Service. “However, placements that feature a combination of audio and visuals are rising indicating an increase in planned placements.”

Negative Political Advertising

For the 2006 mid-term elections, a total of 2,629,685 local television spots ran representing 93% of all political ad expenditures, and that was up by 24% from 2002 mid-term elections. 41% of all political spots in 2006 were classified as negative. Leading the way in negative ads among the top advertisers was the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee with 89% and 85% of their ads being labeled as negative. Following is a snapshot of negative advertising for the mid-term elections of 2006.

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For more information at http://www.nielsen.com