Smaller advertiser leading the way in advertising cutbacks

Smaller advertisers are more acutely sensitive to shifts in the economy and these so-called "long tail" advertisers, who accounted for much of the expansion of U.S. advertising markets in the past couple of years, are now cutting back more than their bigger brethren.

According to data provided by TNS Media Intelligence, reported by MediaDaily News, the bottom third of the market has been cutting back and contributing the most to the 1.7% decline in U. S. ad spending.

"If you go back one or two years, when we were seeing modest growth of 2% or 3% in ad spending, the grow was coming from the bottom of the market. Those smaller, long-tail advertisers were in the forefront of the advance. Now they are leading the retreat," explains Jon Swallen, senior vice president-research and the de facto chief economist at TNS MI.