LONDON: Marketing optimism in April remained high in all of the three regions measured in the latest Global Marketing Index (GMI), but the allocation of budgets to TV has declined for the second successive month.

The headline GMI registered an average 56.5 points in April, where a reading of 50 indicates no change and 60+ suggests rapid growth, in a clear sign that marketers across the world experienced increased business activity.

There were modest variances across the regions, with Asia-Pacific registering the highest headline GMI of 57.7 points, followed by the Americas (56.3) and Europe (55.8). These figures are based on a three month moving average to mitigate abnormal seasonal variations.

Compiled by World Economics, the GMI provides a unique monthly indicator of the state of the global marketing industry because it tracks current conditions for marketers as well as their expectations for trading conditions, marketing budgets and staffing levels.

On the first of these measures, the global trading conditions index stood at 58.6, down 0.9 points from March, but still indicative of strong improvement. Asia-Pacific recorded the highest score of 60.9 in April, followed by Europe (57.7) and the Americas (57.4).

The staffing index, which reflects the number of staff hired compared to the same period last year, registered a value of 58.3 in April. Recruitment was particularly strong in the Americas, where the index registered 59.6, followed by Asia-Pacific (58.4) and Europe (57.5).

The index for global marketing budgets fell a single point to 52.5 in April, the 26th consecutive month of budget growth, but deeper analysis provided evidence that marketers have continued to switch their budgets from TV and other traditional media to digital and mobile.

The index for TV budgets around the world was just 47.5 in April, falling as low as 41.4 in the Americas and 47.1 in Asia-Pacific, with only Europe recording a positive value of 51.7 points.

World Economics raised the possibility that TV advertising could follow traditional media into a "downward spiral", especially as the GMI survey confirmed the continuing rapid growth of mobile and digital budgets, which recorded values of 75.2 and 78.4 respectively.

Ed Jones, chief executive of World Economics, said: "Mobile and digital media continued to gain budget share while expenditure on TV fell as declining viewing suggests it may soon realise the same falling trend in absolute expenditure share experienced by other traditional media."

Data sourced from World Economics, additional content by Warc staff