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Local Advertising Slumping - but Will Soar on Handhelds

Local advertising across newspapers, direct mail, TV, radio, yellow pages, outdoor, magazines and online is expected to slip to $144.4 billion by 2013, down from $155 billion last year, says BIA.

Local ad revenue may hit a low of $135.8 billion in 2010, before climbing a bit in 2011, according to BIA (via Adweek).

Some media, including newspapers, local TV, radio, print yellow pages, and local regional magazines, will need to rethink their traditional business models and look to the internet to find new revenue streams in order to survive. Radio and TV internet revenue will climb to $1.9 billion in 2013, from $805 million last year, according to some estimates.

But other media, including outdoor and direct mail, may be in for a tougher challenge.

Local mobile advertising will be the next hot trend, particularly in terms of local mobile search, BIA’s The Kelsey Group predicts. Local mobile ad revenue will hit more than $3.1 billion in 2013, up from $160 million last year. Mobile search will reach $2.3 billion. Local searches made up 27.8% of all searches in 2008, but are expected to hit 35.1% in 2013.

The mobile market might have boomed sooner, were it not for the economy. Currently, 54 million people use the mobile web; that number should reach 95 million by 2013. Local search will make up more than half of mobile advertising (56%) though local search will only make up just over 35% of all searches.

“Mobile gets you closer to the point of purchase because it goes with you to the store,” says Michael Boland, a senior analyst at The Kelsey Group. “When we come out of this, we’ll see a sudden interest and demand in mobile marketing.”

Boland points out that advertisers will still need a “point of entry,” like an advertising network. No company has truly packaged local mobile search for advertisers yet, he says.