Ad budgets are diverted to flood-relief campaigns

Nannapat Chotrattanakarn, trading and accountability director of Omnicom Media Group, told The Nation that there was no sign of a decline in overall advertising expenditure in September compared with the same period last year, but the agency saw a substantial drop, particularly in television adverts, this month. Some companies had shifted their budgets previously set for television advertising to support donation campaigns conducted by national broadcasters instead.
“Undeniably, prolonged flooding in many provinces in the Kingdom is affecting business in those areas, while transport of new products to those areas has also been disrupted,” she said.
She added that advertisers and marketers would repurchase television commercials in November and December to boost sales revenue if the crisis is solved.
Meanwhile, Rathakorn Surbsuk, GroupM Trading partner, said some advertisers’ changed their spending plans as a result of the flooding, while many advertisers had seen little impact. However, each advertiser has its own reason to reduce its spending.
He added that some advertisers had postponed their marketing campaigns to next year.
The global economy is another area that cannot be ignored, though Rathakorn warned against overreaction. Historical data proves that during the US recession a couple of years ago, advertising spending in Thailand saw minimal impact. However, he said it was still too early to predict what effect the floods and the global economy would have on total ad spending next year.
“If political and other fundamental factors are stable, we believe that we still have a positive picture for next year,” he said.