SMBs’ PPC Ad Spend on Search Engines

We’ve been collecting and analyzing ad spend data of SMBs on various local, vertical and IYP sites for over a year. Last month we started looking at SMBs who also advertise on search engines (i.e. businesses who bought PPC ads on search engines).  

We looked at over 3000 SMBs who advertise online, on different websites, out of which we focused on 300 businesses who also advertised on search engines in the past 5 months. The chart shows the average monthly ad spend of SMBs on search engines over a period of 5 months.

The dramatic drop represented in the chart is probably larger than the actual drop in local search ad budget since we filtered out nationwide chains and all SMBs with more than one office location. The businesses represented in the chart are small businesses where the decision making process is swift, as opposed to large corporations, who have a longer decision making process. Additionally, changes in advertising patterns/behavior appear more quickly when it comes to PPC since PPC campaigns can be modified at any give time, unlike annual advertising contracts.

We cannot be sure of the cause for the significant decrease in dollars spent in the months of September and October. However, we did happen to come across another chart, the similarity of which to our own cannot be ignored…