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The trend to Web-centric marketing seems to be continuing unabated. This recent article points out that Ford Motor “will spend 30 percent of its $1 billion-plus marketing budget this year on ‘targeted’ media.” This targeted category includes Internet marketing, CRM, video on demand, mobile-phone ads, email, sponsorships and direct mail. Online advertising alone will get 15 percent of the budget.

In other news, Nielsen/NetRatings reported that in just one month (July) the total number of online searches increased nearly three percent over the June figures. Total searches for July were 4.454 billion. Many analysts had expected search figures to drop in the heart of the summer season, but this was certainly not the case.

Things are heating up even more for online retail sales. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, online retail was up 26 percent in the second quarter of this year compared with the same quarter in 2004. The story also points out that total online sales for the second quarter were nearly $1 trillion dollars!

According to BtoB Magazine, there is a pronounced shift at several major media companies away from print advertising revenue and towards online advertising. Dow Jones & Company’s 2005 second quarter b-to-b print advertising revenues declined 7.2 percent from a year ago while their online b-to-b advertising revenue increased 33.5 percent over the same period. CNET Networks’ interactive advertising revenue growth in the second quarter was equally impressive…increasing 30 percent over comparable 2004 figures.