Growth in marketer confidence mirrors expected mobile spend

The headline GMI figure, which takes into account marketers’ expectations in three areas: marketing budgets, staffing levels and trading conditions, was up 1.1 points to 58.3. Broken down by region, headline GMI was at 59.9 for the Americas (up 2.4 points from March); 57.5 for Europe (up 0.5 points); and 57.4 for Asia Pacific (no change).

GMI is an indicator of the state of the global marketing industry. A reading of 50 indicates no change from the previous month, while a reading of 60 indicates rapid growth.

More detailed results are as follows:

Marketing budgets*: Global: 55.6 ( 1.4 point gain)

Europe: 55.1 ( 2.8 point gain)

Asia Pacific: 55.6 ( 0.5 point gain)

Americas: 55.7 ( 0.2 point gain)

*Total boosted by strongest expected growth recorded for mobile for two years: 4.9 point growth to 75.2.

Staffing levels:

Europe: 58.4 ( 3.2 point gain)

Asia Pacific: 56.3 ( 2.3 point gain)

Americas: 60.5 ( 3.9 point gain)

Trading conditions: Global: 61.1 ( 1.4 point drop)

Europe: 58.9 ( 4.6 point drop)

Asia Pacific: 60.4 ( 2.8 point drop)

Americas: 63.5 ( 3.1 point gain)

“This is another month of strong data, signalling that marketers are becoming increasingly optimistic within the broader economic improvement,” said Suzy Young, data and journals director at Warc.

“The very sharp increase in planned mobile spend is especially striking this month, and signals that the general shift in marketing budgets towards digital could actually be accelerating in the months ahead,” she added.