Advertising spending in Indonesian newspapers have "increased significantly since 2006," up more than 20 percent on average, a Nielsen media research firm executive told The Jakarta Globe yesterday. Conventional media advertising in newspapers and TV continue to dominate ad spending in the country, and ad spend has seen an overall increase of 54 percent year-on-year, Maika Randini explained.

With newspapers offering large display spaces, telecom companies have contributed to the largest advertising spend in conventional media accounting to Rp 1.3 trillion in the period between January to March 2010, out of the total ad spends in both forms of media amounting to Rp 13 trillion (US$1.46 billion), according to figures by Neilsen. The ad spends have seen an overall increase of 54 percent in comparison to last year figures.

Image: Maciej Dakowicz's flickr photostreamWhile the shift to digital medium has not been observed in Indonesia, Firman Kurniawan, lecturer of marketing communications at the University of Indonesia, predicts it will happen eventually.

"Advertisers still think it is more effective to place ads in newspapers because there is still no major change in the media consumption behavior of Indonesian people from conventional to digital," he said.

According to findings detailed in the recently released Boston Globe report, 47 percent of Indonesian digital consumers read popular online news portals like Detik.com and Kompas.com, The Jakarta Globe reported.

Pointing out the fact that most Indonesian advertisers still consider banner ads on websites as an "extension of advertising in conventional media," Ricky Pesik, the secretary of the Jakarta chapter of the Indonesian Association of Advertising Agencies (PPPI) said that, "Advertisers are spending heavily to campaign for their products through social media, and these budgets are not detected by research firms."