According to a B2B article, IDC’s 2007 survey of tech vendors’ marketing budgets showed that 6.3% of the budget goes on PR (down from 7.1%) and a further 2.2% on analyst relations (up from 2.0%). Of course the whole marketing budget is growing as marketing operations approaches take hold. Two numbers provides a vital benchmarking ratio for IT solution providers: on average spend on AR is equivalent to 35% of the media relations budget. Of course, that means subtracting AR from common definitions of PR: if AR and PR are added together at your firm, then the benchmark for AR was 26% of the total in 2007.
Of course these are averages: spending on AR is concentrated in firms selling high-value B2B contracts, and is rare in B2C and consumer technology markets. However, the dats represent a substantial 10% increase on AR’ share of the marketing budget from 2006. The AR/PR ratio remains quite a reliable benchmark against which to measure budgets.
Postscript: ten years later, in 2017, AR spend has risen to 44% of the media relations budget.
