Things Could Get Worse for U.S. Print Media

This chart compares selected media’s share of the time Americans spent with media with their share of total ad spend in 2012.

Last month, we reported on the collapse of newspaper advertising in the past decade. Newspaper ad spending in the United States peaked in 2000 and has since then dropped to a level as low as it hasn’t been in 50 years. Magazines have suffered a similar fate and according to data released by eMarketer last week, the situation could get even worse for print media in the United States.

eMarketer compared selected media’s share of the time Americans spent with media with their share of total ad spend in 2012.

While in the cases of TV, online and radio, the time spent with the medium is roughly proportionate to the share of ad expenditure, newspapers and magazines hold a significantly larger share of total ad spend than they should if ad spend were proportional to the time spent with the medium. American adults on average only spend 3.1 percent of their media time reading offline newspapers, yet newspapers rake in 11.5 percent of total media ad revenues.

The opposite holds true for mobile: Americans spend 11.7 percent of their media time on mobile devices, yet mobile advertising only accounts for 1.6 percent of total ad spend.

If the numbers at hand are any indication for the future growth of advertising mediums, mobile advertising is about to take off. For newspapers and magazines however, the worst may be yet to come.