August 21, 2006 | Monday

Sir Martin Sorrell is bullish on the future

By Jackie Danicki - Blogger in Marketing |Quotations

If not actually in decline, then [traditional media] is certainly flattening out. The growth in the market is in the internet, but that too will have to stand the test of time.

This statement accompanied WPP’s prediction that the UK advertising industry will see stronger growth next year than in this one.

While Sir Martin said that its internet advertising business in the UK had been particularly strong, Britain’s television market had been weak.

As evidence, he pointed to a report by GroupM, WPP’s media planning and buying arm, which forecast that by November internet advertising in the UK is set to account for 14 per cent of all ad spend — overtaking the share held by national newspapers. He said: “The UK television market has been awful this year. We’ll have to see what happens next year with the changes at ITV.”

Any bets on it taking more than some changes at ITV for the television advertising industry to make huge gains?