“The Internet has enabled advertising that is more segmented and measurable, making it more efficient than traditional advertising channels, such as newspaper classifieds, radio spots, and television commercials,” writes Yossi Matias, senior director and head of Google’s Israel R&D Center. “These measurements have led to better pricing models, which are based on online real-time auctions.”

These wizards will occasionally emerge from the secret Google lair to attend seminars and workshops, where they will amaze the village folk with their findings. Eventually the research will be published for the masses.

Worldwide spending on Internet advertising contracted for the second consecutive quarter, by 5%, to $13.9 billion from $14.7 billion in the same quarter a year ago, according to market research group IDC. U.S. spending declined for the second quarter in a row, by 7% year over year, to $6.2 billion from $6.6 billion.

All major advertising formats saw year-over-year revenue losses, with search ads being least affected, display ads losing 12%, and classifieds shrinking 17%. All major publishers’ ad sales declined, for the most part at double-digit loss rates, with Google being the only exception, posting low single-digit growth. Monster.com saw a 31% decline, suffering from the terrible condition of the classifieds business in the current downturn, and AOL was also hit hard, by both the weakness in display ads as well as internal sales problems.

The IDC expects U.S. advertisers to decrease their online spending quarter over quarter in in the third quarter by about the same amount as they did in the first and second quarters of 2009. But….

“We think the industry will continue to see losses in the third and fourth quarters, but the growth rates – or the loss rates, if you will – will eventually begin to improve. However, we also believe the industry may have to wait until mid-2010 until it sees real growth again,” according to Karsten Weide, program director, Digital Media and Entertainment at IDC.

The results should be no surprise, and if your clients aren’t online then they’re definitely missing opportunities in the form of increased inquiries, new and repeat customers and better sales – no ifs, ands or buts about it.

The most recent studies show that people throughout the world are increasing the amount of time that they spend online. These studies also show that U.S. users alone spend an average of nearly an hour and a half (86.8 minutes) on the Internet every single day. As the amount of time spent online grows, so too does the power and effectiveness of online information for reaching various markets.

It’s important to make sure that your clients understand how and why the Internet is quickly becoming the world’s most powerful and influential source of information and because it so effectively reaches so many, those who fail to embrace this media will almost certainly be left behind.

Here are some key points from the latest research that you can share with them:

Internet usage has increased worldwide. The growth in Internet marketing potential has been nothing short of phenomenal.

The Miniwatts Marketing Group has been charting Internet usage by world region since 1995. Statistics show an overall increase in Internet market penetration. In fact, less than 1% of the world’s population (.4%) were regular Internet users in 1995. The most recent figures, from March of 2008, show an Internet usage increase of over 2000%. From that same source, we also know that worldwide Internet usage figures are now at 21.1 % or the world’s population (1,407 million Internet users worldwide).

No other type of media has grown so dramatically during the same time period.

Internet usage has grown most rapidly in industrialized nations. Internet usage in industrialized regions of the world, where individuals tend to have a higher per capita income, has increased even more rapidly than in other areas.

Through the Internet, you can reach over 1 billion individuals worldwide — most of whom are educated and literate with a disposable income. No other single form of media can give you such a broad reach.

More statistics to bolster these claims:

•    The most recent data from the Miniwatts Market Group statistics shows that Internet usage in the Americas (North and South) accounts for over 25% of international usage, with nearly half (42%) of everyone in this region using the Internet.
•    Internet usage statistics for another industrialized region, Europe, accounts for another quarter (27.1%) of all Internet usage worldwide. In Europe, 47.7% of the population uses the Internet.
•    As high as the Internet usage figures are for the Americas and for Europe, the statistics show that the highest number of Internet users in the Asian region of the world, where over 529 million Internet users account for 37.6% of all Internet usage worldwide.
•    Taken together, Internet usage in these three regions alone (the Americas, Europe, and Asia) accounts for over 92% of the world’s Internet usage.

Internet usage is replacing television. What are all those Internet users doing online? An awful lot of them are watching videos that they might have seen on television (or heard on the radio) in an earlier generation.

In fact, studies show that 80% of all Internet users now watch online video. In a single month, February of 2008, there were 116 million unique viewers for online video. In that same month, there were 6.3 billion streams of online video viewed, or an average of 54.7 streams of online video per every online viewer.

There is no doubt that a growing marketing force within the Internet is the area of video. The online video audience is increasing. Studies show that online video is an increasingly effective marketing tool. It has also been shown that online video viewers rely on the information that they view to make decisions and form opinions.

Online video viewers rely on the Internet to make decisions. Online videos are also an important factor in influencing the decision-making process of viewers. Studies show that 80% of online video viewers have watched an ad online, and of that 80% who watched an ad, 52% then went on to take some kind action.

It may be these statistics that have caused advertisers to pour more money into online video advertising: $1.4 billion has been spent in online video advertising in 2008. In fact, it is estimated that by 2011 advertisers will spend over $4 billion a year on advertising for online video alone.

With these statistics and track record of proven results, your clients can’t afford to ignore the Internet and online video in particular (though, of course, there are still some who, for whatever reason, ignore it anyway).

Make sure that you (and your clients) take advantage of this ever-changing media whose enormous potential in terms of growing marketing presence and increasing the proverbial bottom line cannot and should not be overlooked or under-estimated.

“There’s very little quality research out there, and even less for free, so we are very excited to offer one of the top destinations for free research white papers,” said Robert Regular, Publisher of ADOTAS.

Check out the section here or check out the research tab on the ADOTAS web site.

According to the US Online Local Advertising Forecast, 2007—2012, released by JupiterResearch, local advertising will increase by 13% from 2007 to 2012. This is faster than online advertising as a whole which is only projected to grow about 12% in the same time frame. The biggest impact is anticipated to be made by local display and search advertising with compound annual growth rates (CAGRs) of 18% and 16% respectively, during the next five years.

Lead Analyst Barry Parr, Media Analyst for JupiterResearch stated “Although traditional media such as newspaper and local broadcast are facing new challenges regarding their business models, local advertising in these media mainstays is not a dying market. The ability to assemble relatively larger general audiences will remain a principal advantage of traditional media.”

David Schatsky, President of Jupiter Research said in the statement “At this point, most local advertisers are not marketers and do not have the time or resources to manage, let alone optimize, online advertising campaigns. Although search is increasing its impact on the local market, it still demands a degree of sophistication unavailable to most local advertisers.”

One of the major findings was that user-generated content influences about 58% of all purchases in China compared to only 19% in the United States. This means that social media companies stand to benefit from their current business practices. These consumers are highly engaged online with a 47% total of broadband users posting comments on blogs, chat rooms and forums compared to only 28% of broadband users in the U.S. Managing director of Media-Screen LLC and creator of Netpop Josh Crandall said “The pull market trend is only accelerating. There is a wide gap found between consumer behavior and the allocation of marketing assets. We’re really attempting to provide CMOs the evidence to back up their case for increases online ad expenditures.”

Search engines also proved to be the most influential source for making purchase decisions in both countries with 46% of Chinese broadband consumers using search and 25% of U.S. broadband users using search for purchase decisions. Crandall continued “As companies increasingly target a worldwide audience through Internet technologies, it is critical for marketers and product developers to understand the unique perspectives that countries exhibit in the adoption and use of these technologies. Today’s data suggests that Chinese consumers frequently turn to one another, in addition to corporate media sources, when making purchase decisions.”

Other insights include that the average broadband user in China is 32 years old which is 10 years younger than in the U.S.; and 75% of Chinese online consumers access the Internet from work, compared to only 41% of Americans. Netpop makes this information easily accessible and affordable all people looking to utilize study information.

There are options to pick specific graph information on the site as well, allowing a cost-effective way to find data that is relevant to each individual searching rather than the sometimes wasted time and money buying the entire report. The entire report is also available on the site. It is important to understand the mindset of the Chinese consumer as it is the second largest online community and the next frontier for online advertisers and marketers.

“Despite the growing popularity of YouTube, MySpace, and Facebook, gaming remains the king of online entertainment, driven largely by casual gaming activities,” said James Kuai, a research analyst at Parks Associates. “Gaming also has business advantages. Unlike sites for social networking and video streaming, which rely solely on advertising revenue, casual gaming has more mature and heterogeneous revenue models, including web-based and in-game advertising, try-before-you-buy, subscriptions, and micro-transactions.”

The year-over-year growth rate for frequent online gamers was 79%, significantly higher than the growth rate for users of social networking (46%). However, the growth rate for frequent users of video streaming sites was 123%, which could pose a significant challenge to the gaming industry in capturing the online leisure time of Internet users.

“The casual gaming industry cannot rest on its laurels,” Kuai said. “In order to counter the growing competition from other online activities, the industry needs to continue to grow its fan base and find ways to better monetize its existing audience.”

Casual Gaming Market Update provides in-depth analysis of the current dynamics and future direction of the rapidly growing casual gaming industry, including quantitative forecasts, competitive analysis, consumer perspectives, and profiles of leading companies in the casual gaming value chain.