I may be a bit late to the prediction party, I have been reading many blogs and articles relating to 2011 marketing prognostications for what seems like months, but here we are, truly on the eve of 2011 and thought now would be a good time to summarize and point out differences in some marketing spending/budget stats for 2011.

One of the most basic poll results came from the IAB’s Smart Brief poll; they asked four questions, the first being the following:

The Hyperlocal factor isn’t as relevant in the B2B environment, but the other three areas seemed to align with 2011 projects Godfrey has in the pipeline. We do see mobile as an area for growth. The fact that more and more people are utilizing smart phones to access web content puts greater emphasis on making sure your website is mobile optimized and is something B2B marketers will need to address soon. Jennifer Brown did a great post on this last April, see "Do B2B marketers need a mobile app or mobile website."

Some of the major media forecasters project an increase in global and U.S. ad spending for 2011. BtoB magazine summarized predictions from ZenithOptimedia, MagnaGlobal and E-marketer, with forecasts indicating a 2-4% increase in overall ad spending in the U.S. According to E-marketer, online ad spending is expected to grow by about 14% next year, with video advertising expected to lead the charge. Newspapers and B2B magazines had the largest percentage of decline in 2010, and all signs point to print continuing to decline next year.

Another interesting study comes via Marketing Sherpa, from a report they released in October. Marketers are planning to test out, and the increase in spend is confirmation that they have been using these tactics and they are working.

This information doesn’t even address mobile, but it does seem to line up with trends we are seeing—print advertising, trade shows and direct mail are all decreasing in budget allocations. The move toward spending more in the digital space is not surprising, but the level of increase is pretty notable. Close to 70% of marketers in this study are planning to increase investment in website design/optimization and social media. And 60% indicated they would increase SEO, virtual events/webinars and email marketing. These aren’t “new” media channels that marketers are trying out for the first time, but rather online tactics they have been using for a few years and are producing solid results. In the beginning B2B marketers allocated money toward online because it tended to be lower cost, but now they aren’t necessarily less expensive, just more cost effective. It definitely seems as if 2011 will be another year where marketing spend will continue to shift toward online. As for my personal forecast or prediction, I think that in the B2B world, mobile optimized web content and online video will have the most discussion and interest, but we will have to wait and see if marketers allocate budget in 2011.