Telecommunication Sector Dominates Ad Expenditures in 2006
Friday, 19 January, 2007 | 15:37 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta: Ad expenditures in 2006 on national electronic and print media were dominated by telecommunication products. Nielsen Media Research has it that ad expenditures of the products increased from Rp1.393 trillion in 2005 to Rp1.976 trillion in 2006 or a growth of 42 percent.

Executive Director of Nielsen Media Research Ananto Pratikno said that the rise was considered the highest growth among the top 10 product categories that advertised in all the media. “This is the first time that telecommunication products are the largest advertisers,' he said yesterday (01/18) in Jakarta.

Previously, ad expenditures of the products have always been categorized in the top three after cigarettes and hair treatment products. As a comparison, the growth of ads of telecommunication products between 2004 and 2005 was only 15 percent. However, as of 2005, ad expenditures of telecommunication products was apparently intensive.

Telkomsel and Nokia, said Ananto, were telecommunication producers that have mostly advertised among their competitors. Of top ten ads of telecommunication products in 2006, the value of Telkomsel ad expenditures (all SIM cards) reached Rp223 billion and Nokia, Rp215 billion.

However, the high ad expenditures were not useless. The reason was that the penetration of cellular phones increased by 25 percent in 2006, against 2005. “Telkomsel and Nokia have become the telecommunication products that were mostly used by our people,” said Ananto. The previous year, the penetration of cellular phones was only 5 percent.

Ananto explained that the trend increase of ad expenditures of telecommunication products have also occurred in Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong, New Zealand, and Australia. In Indonesia, the research was conducted in 12 cities such as Jakarta, Bogor, Tangerang, Bekasi, Surabaya, Medan and Makassar.

However, generally speaking, said Ananto, many media players evaluated that the media industry in 2006 was below par, despite the fact that Nielsen Media Research recorded ad expenditures in 2006 reached Rp30 trillion or 17 percent growth against 2005. Nevertheless, media owners and advertising agencies felt that it was becoming more difficult to look for ads. “Moreover, they sold the ads at the cheapest price,” he said.

Taufik Kamil