Overall search advertising spending decelerated in the United States during second quarter despite robust growth by travel-related companies and in mobile advertising, according to a report released Thursday by IgnitionOne, a digital marketing company.
The study found that search spending in Q2 was up 15.5 percent compared to Q2 2011. At nearly half the growth rate of last quarter, this represents a slowdown in growth of paid search spending. This slowdown in growth of spend can be presumably blamed on the current weakness of the macro-economy and softness of the retail vertical in the quarter.
U.S. Mobile search spending grew to 14% from 12% of total search budgets with a huge 333% increase in spend YoY. The mobile search ads also had greater growth in engagement as click grew 325% while impressions grew 130%.
Finally, in a continuation from last quarter’s trend there was impressive growth in travel-related activity and spend in Q2 compared to the same time period last year. Travel impressions were up 61.9% and search spend among travel marketers increased 37.8% YoY.
