Outsell: digital to exceed print B2B revenues

For the first time in business-to-business (B2B) media, online and other digital revenues will be larger than print revenues. According to a recent report from Outsell Insights, in 2009, the change will occur with online avenues finally outreaching print for B2B marketers.

by Kristina Knight

The change should be no surprise to marketers because print revenues have been falling off for the past few years. In 2005 Outsell researchers found that print revenues fell from 48.9% (about $9.2 billion) to about 32% (roughly $8.1 billion). Outsell has forecast continued print revenue slumps of 5% this year and 2% in 2008.

However, with strong growth in digital revenues, Outsell expects B2B advertising to remain strong. Digital ad revenue is forecast to increase 17% in 2007 to reach just over 22% of total electronic revenue. 2008 is expected to see 17% growth and in 2009 researchers expect to see 13%. By 2010, growth in digital is expected to slide to 10%.

What is interesting is that even with the growth slides in 2009 and 2010, forecasters expect the digital spend to exceed the print spend in 2009. At that time digital revenues will be responsible for about 38% ($9.15 billion) of the total B2B revenues according to the report.