NEW YORK: Spending on PR will top $8 billion in the next three years, a hefty 55% increase over 2008 expenditures, according to the annual Communications Industry Forecast by private equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS).
The $8 billion figure – recently cited in an Economist article on the vitality of the industry – contains $3 billion that will be spent on word-of-mouth marketing, which includes social media outreach as well as offline brand ambassador programs. Jim Rutherfurd, EVP and ...