New research published in the US and reported by MediaPost indicates that business-to-business (B2B) media is seeing a rapid shift of advertising revenue from the traditional print channels to online platforms. The research was conducted by Outsell Inc. also shows that overall B2B revenues have decreased since 2005.

The findings show that the print share of total B2B revenue fell from 58.3% to 40% between 2003 and 2008, as online revenues jumped from 18% to 33.9%. The remaining share came from events, which stayed around a quarter of total revenues. The main period of change happened between 2005 and 2007, when print revenue declined from 53.1% to 44.1%, while online increased from 22.1% to 30.2%.

The report says that a good part of the percentage shift from print to online simply reflects diminishing print revenues and although there is a changing pattern, there is no question that the future of B2B media lies online. Infact the article says that "B2B has been confronted with the same dilemma faced by other print media, including consumer magazines and newspapers -- online, while a promising area for new revenue growth in its own right, has so far failed to offset much larger losses on the print side".