European marketing budgets continue to recover

GLOBAL — The latest Global Marketing Index (GMI) data for October shows a continued recovery in European marketing budgets, offset by a decline in the Americas.

The headline GMI for October was 55.2, up slightly from 55.0 in September and 55.1 in August. The index is compiled by World Economics and provides a monthly indicator of the state of the global marketing industry, tracking current conditions for marketers as well as their expectations for budgets and staffing levels.

Marketing activity grew most strongly in Europe, where the headline GMI rose from 57.5 to 58.6, while in Asia Pacific the index was down from 54.1 to 53.8. In America it dropped from 52.8 to 51.8.

The GMI data for October also revealed a trend towards allocating more budgets to digital media: globally the index value for digital was up 0.9 points to 74.9, while mobile was up 0.5 points to 71.8.

“The headline GMI for October indicated that marketing activity is still rising across the world in all regains but at a slower pace than in 2014,” said Ed Jones, World Economics chief executive. “Europe is standing out with continuing increases in adspend while the Americas are cutting overheads.

“It is still clear that digital and mobile are expanding rapidly in all regions at the expense of traditional media.”

Full data can be accessed here.