Thailand lags behind world

Digital advertising in Thailand still faces limitations on growth, particularly the country's low penetration of broadband Internet.

As brands around the world spend more and more of their advertising budgets on digital media, few in Thailand are entering the pool to stay ahead of their competitors and reach out to the consumer in a more effective way.

Stephanie Bell, CEO of Mind Share and Group M, said the penetration of broadband Internet in Thailand was 7-10 per cent and the speed of broadband Internet 10-50 times slower than in Europe.

"This is the main reason digital grows not so fast in Thailand," said Bell, adding, however, that digital advertising had the potential for fast growth, with more and more people involved.

She said marketers in the US, Europe, the Middle East and Africa were confidently spending on digital advertising, both online and mobile.

Recent statistics show both Internet- and mobile-users are continuously on the increase, which means the pool of potential customers of brand managers, marketers and strategic planners is expanding daily.

"In Asia, the Internet penetration rate is increasing, and mobile access is huge. There is no doubt that mobile advertising is a growing worldwide trend and definitely growing fastest in Asia, where creative marketers want to use mobiles to develop effective and connecting advertising communications. In Asia, everyone owns a mobile or wants to," Bell said.

She said the average penetration of mobile phones in Asia was 80 per cent and in Thailand more than 70 per cent.

However, Siwat Chawareewong, managing director of mInteraction, said more than half of the mobile phones in Thailand had out-of-date technology incompatible with the latest digital ads.

"Expenditure on digital advertising in Thailand is expected to increase sharply to Bt1.8 billion this year, up from Bt1 billion in 2007. Yet the ratio of this on mobile phones is seen as a mere 3-5 per cent," Siwat said, adding that Thailand was now at the stage where local advertisers were looking for formats to place digital ads on handsets.

Mali Wuestenhagen, a consultant to Eyeblaster, said the click-through rate of digital banners was declining gradually around the world from 0.5 per cent in 2005 to 0.3 per cent in 2006 and less than 0.2 per cent last year.

"Today, marketers who place their communication messages online must look at interactive and how to engage consumers with the brand, how to create a positive brand experience for the customers. This is because consumers nowadays are not clicking any more, but rather want information on the spot," Mali said.