Facebook Moves Up to 3rd Place in Online Ad-Selling

Facebook now holds third place in total U.S. online display advertising revenues, according to a new survey. Facebook sits at 7% of Net Online Ad Revenues, according to research firm eMarketer. Google GOOG is in first with 40.8%, and Yahoo! YHOO is second, at 11%. Facebook has become more prominent in online advertising in the past few years, with some sources projecting the company will earn revenues of more than $2 billion next year. It appears that the consolidation of the ad market has also benefited Google at the expense of competitors Yahoo! and AOL AOL. According to the report, "Google's gains are being driven largely by search. Search revenues will be up 23.6% at the site this year, and Microsoft's MSFT revenues will grow even more quickly. Search dollars at Yahoo! and AOL will continue their downward trend." David Hallerman, eMarketer's principal analyst, noted: “Microsoft's solid growth rates are due to the overall efficiency of the Bing search engine in delivering relevant results to searchers, as well as the company's marketing of Bing to encourage more usage. But Google's lesser growth represents a more than $2 billion increase this year, compared to only an estimated $322 million increase for Microsoft.” Hallerman didn't applaud Microsoft's search partnership deal with Yahoo!. He commented: “Further, Microsoft's deal with Yahoo! has not yet helped the latter company. Google has benefited from the delayed fruition of the search alliance, steadily gaining market share as the alliance's combined share has remained relatively flat.” The eMarketer report notes that "More than two-thirds of US online ad spending will go to just five companies in 2011, eMarketer estimates, up from 63% in 2009 and expected to increase further next year."