The major Norwegian and Nordic players are on the offensive again.

With positivity into the summer!

We can now look back on the first half of the advertising market for 2021. A half-year that has gone better than expected. We now believe in further growth.

I must admit that we had extra question marks ahead of 2021 in the advertising market. But we have achieved a positive response. Not only is the psychology positive. There is also positive development in most of the categories within advertising sales.

Digital growth is back in full swing. All indications are that it will continue.

In recent years, Aller Media has invested heavily in video, both editorially and commercially. This was where we were going to have the big upswing. This was where we were extra strong in our belief.

And this has really paid off, both for us and for the market.

If we look at the Media Barometer of the Norwegian Association of Media Agencies, we register a growth of 18.1 percent after the first five months of the year overall, compared to last year. Video alone has grown by 44.5 percent in the first five months of the year, to NOK 254 million.

IRM's advertising figures for the first quarter of this year show a positive development of 7.0 percent overall, compared with the same period last year. If we look at the digital category display in isolation, which includes video and social media, an increase of 21.1 percent was recorded in the first quarter. The first quarter delivered!

IRM's forecasts are also positive. The total advertising market is expected to increase by 10.1 percent this year compared to 2020. IRM's estimates show that 2022 is also expected to see a significant increase.

A lot of exciting things are happening in many areas at the moment. There have been positive reports from the job market, many stock exchanges are upbeat, many new positions are being recruited for, IRM's advertising estimates are positive - as is the trend for the first quarter of this year. Sales via Norwegian media agencies are also increasing compared to last year.

Even though the pandemic has put a stop to "normal development", we should be pleased with all the positive signals that are now coming day by day - and into the summer of 2021.

One of the positive things that is happening is that the major Norwegian and Nordic players seem to be on the offensive again. Schibsted, Egmont, Amedia, Aller Media and others all seem to be on the move. Perhaps together we can cut the lead that the multinationals have gained over the next few years. There are many indications that last year they secured around NOK 7 billion in the Norwegian advertising market.

The Norwegian and Nordic media players are becoming increasingly better at collecting information, storing information and making relevant use of their own data. Schibsted has theirs in place, while Amedia and Aller Media have long since adopted aID for this identification.

We are talking about so-called sharp data, with a level of precision that the industry has never seen before. It's not a small representative sample that says something about the whole. It's not what you think, but what you know that counts.

Next year, the use of cookies in relation to third parties will disappear. This will benefit media companies that are good at collecting and managing user data via various ID solutions. Here, we in the media companies have a responsibility - and we must prove ourselves worthy of it. The data will benefit consumers, editorial development and advertisers who want to reach their respective target groups in the right place at the right time.

We are already good at accuracy and target group orientation. But we can always get better. And so can we - every single day!

We at Aller Media are of course looking forward to the pandemic being more or less history. We are sick and tired of the pandemic.

But we are also left with a number of lessons from the COVID-19 period, which effectively put a stop to a lot of things from mid-March 2020. Internally, we developed a digital culture, with our own ministers of culture and our own cultural council.

The digital toolbox was developed - and we created digital activities around wine tips, home styling, Spanish courses, book tips, beer brewing and more. This is what we take with us from the positive account during the pandemic period.

On the one hand, there was physical distance. On the other hand, there was actual cultural proximity within our business.

We are now looking forward to a warm and good summer where the positive pandemic news is lining up. This will also provide further momentum in the media and communications market.

The start of summer is very good. Happy summer!

Bente Klemetsdal

Executive Vice President, Sales and Marketing, Aller Media