WARC worked along two scenarios for ad spend, including a low growth and a high growth option. In the first scenario, the press ad market could shrink from £6.7 billion to £5.096 billion by 2019, while the overall ad market could grow by 16.8% in the same period.

In the high-growth scenario, the press ad market is still expected to shrink by about £700 million, from £6.7 billion last year to £6.019 billion, while the overall ad market is predicted to grow by 38%, to £21.97 billion.

The directories sector and regional newspapers are likely to most suffer from the decline of the press ad market.

The report underlined the fact that the Internet would be the biggest winner – notwithstanding of economic conditions. Depending on the growth scenario, Internet ad spend is projected to grow more than 250% to 300% by 2019.

"Press advertising will lose out to the internet in terms of both display and classified advertising, but much more so in terms of the classified sector because [online] paid-for search is so big," said a spokesman from WARC.

Source: Guardian