It has been a recurring theme since mid 2008, large corporations announcing forecast reductions and losses. Amidst this climate, the ad industry has also had its fair share of grim announcements.

But the silver lining for the ad industry may be ROI intensive ad campaigns. So while marketing departments may be cutting back on ad dollars, they are still going to be spending those budgets somewhere. Rich Cherecwich says that we may see those dollars being re-directed into social media and online video.

Here is a brief excerpt from what he had to say on the topic:

“…With the current economic recession, digital marketing professionals are holding out hope that some of the budget dollars originally slated for traditional marketing will move into the cheaper, more measurable digital medium — and they just might be in luck.

More than half of the assembled brand buyers surveyed at the iMedia Brand Summit in Coconut Point, Fla. plan to “heavy up” on measurable, ROI-driven advertising strategies. In these dire economic times, if marketers can’t determine that a particular tactic demonstrates ROI, then they’ll slash it.

But when it comes to customer usage and marketing dollars, what aspects of digital will be the big winner in the coming months? More than half of the brand marketers believe it will be online video (29 percent) or social media (28 percent)…”