Marketing Society UK Confidence Index   

We will be measuring the confidence of the UK marketing industry on a regular basis to paint a picture of key trends. Here is the first report.

Respondents in the latest Marketing Society confidence index are being cautiously optimistic about the challenges they are facing in the current economic climate. Generating sales emerged as the key priority for marketers and a significant majority expected their marketing budget to either stay the same or increase over the second half of 2009. While search engine optimisation has emerged as a preferred marketing channel amongst marketing society members, direct mail and the press have certainly not been cast aside. Cinema, mobile and outdoor media definitely has its work cut out to convince marketers to see it as a priority channel.

The relationship between marketing and sales grows ever closer, with 33.9% of respondents saying ‘generating sales to bolster the bottom line’ was the number one priority for their marketing budget. Acquiring new customers was the number one priority for 27.8% of marketers responding to the survey, whilst retaining existing customers was considered the priority by 19.1%. Only 4.3% of respondents were planning to prioritise re-engaging lapsed customers and just 7.8% were putting brand building at the top of the agenda for the second half of 2009.

Three quarters of the confidence index respondents were not expecting to have to work to a smaller budget, despite the difficult economic climate, with 48.7% expecting their overall marketing budget to remain the same and 26.1% anticipating a budget increase. However, over a quarter of respondents (27.9%) are planning a reduction in the number of agencies they use, with only 2.3% considering an increase in their agency roster and the rest (69.4%) planning to continue to use the same number of agencies. 

The importance of having search results at the top of the rankings is clearly being felt by Marketing Society members, as Search Engine Optimisation/natural search, was listed in their top three marketing channels for the forthcoming financial year by 52.2% of those surveyed. Direct Mail was considered the second most important, a top three priority for 44.2%, whilst Press came in the top three for 31.9% of respondents. Online display advertising was ranked in the top three channels by 25.7%, followed by Experiential (21.2%) and Paid Search (20.4%.) Cinema advertising was not considered a top three priority by any respondents and Mobile marketing was only considered a priority by 4.4%, with only 7.1% considering outdoor/ambient as important for their business in the next year.