Direct marketing budgets predicted to maintain strong growth levels according to DMA Expenditure Trends Survey

The research was carried out in February and March of 2005 by the Future Foundation and involved interviewing 400 UK companies to get an accurate picture of present and likely future spend on direct marketing within a companies total marketing budget. The research shows that year on year direct marketing budgets are more likely to have increased than total marketing budgets, and that dm budgets are also less volatile and prone to fluctuations than overall marketing budgets.

Mike Barnes, DMA Director of Marketing and Business Development commented, "The aim of this research was to develop the most comprehensive indicator of overall expenditure trends within UK direct marketing. By carrying out this research twice a year and interpreting the results in the context of the changing economic environment, we hope to build up a unique picture of the current structure of the industry and future changes in budgets. Along with the DMA's other key research projects, these findings provide our members and the industry as a whole, with valuable information about the success of dm and highlight the importance and influence of direct marketing as a communications channel.

The research also showed variations in anticipated final levels of expenditure when dm was broken down into sub-categories of direct marketing. This breakdown showed that new media (including websites, email, interactive TV and text message promotions) and direct mail had the largest increase in actual expenditure in comparison to their predicted budgets.

When looking at future budgets there was less of a disparity between expected direct marketing budgets and total marketing budgets yet the research did highlight that even when total marketing budgets were expected to go down, direct marketing budgets were less likely to be cut.

The full report is available free of charge to DMA members. Non members can purchase the full report at a cost and have free access the Executive Summary. Visit www.dma.org.uk/researchfor further details.