Last month, American TV viewers were exposed to almost 1.48 million political ads, up from the 1.41 million political ads aired in October 2008 (the last major presidential election year), according to data released today by Nielsen. It was the largest political ad output on record in what is traditionally known as the busiest month of the year for political messaging. Nielsen data over the last five calendar years suggest that TV distributors air twice as many political and issue ads in October than any other month, on average.

For some media markets, political ads are especially dominant in the local TV landscape, and nowhere is this more evident than Ohio.  In an analysis of local broadcast TV outlets in the top 128 U.S. markets in October, Cleveland stations aired the highest proportion of political and issue advertising.  Nielsen found that about one out of every four paid TV ads aired on local Cleveland stations was placed by a political candidate or outside political group. Ohio’s capital city Columbus placed a very close second in the ranking with an estimated 23.37% of paid ads bought by political entities. Portland, OR, Sacramento, CA, and Seattle, WA round out the top 5.

Ohio’s status as a political TV battleground is nothing new.  In 2008, six Ohio DMAs placed among the top 20 markets with the highest rate of political ads in October, and in the last midterm election in 2006, five markets from the Buckeye State placed in the top 20.

Of course, not all U.S. TV markets were as politically saturated. Ohioans seeking a respite from this year’s political noise may have wanted to lay low in Jackson, MS, where only one percent of paid TV ads airing on local stations were classified as political or issue ads. The Richmond, VA market had the second lowest rate of political saturation among the 128 markets analyzed in October at just 2.45%.  Richmond’s ranking comes in stark contrast to the same time last year, when it ranked fourth nationally in political TV saturation, thanks to a high-profile governor’s race in an otherwise off year for political campaigns.

Interestingly, Texas offered four of the ten least saturated markets last month.

Download the full rankings of all 128 markets contained in Nielsen’s October political advertising analysis.

The analysis shows that the campaign voicemail gaffe helped to push Brown’s name past Republican Meg Whitman’s in both national online buzz  and in on-air television mentions in California’s top media markets. It had been at least 10 days since Brown led his opponent in either category, but the negative exposure was certainly not the way the campaign would have liked to take the lead.

The drama occurred during a week where both campaigns significantly stepped up their overall ad buys. Whitman aired  3,727 ads across California’s top four media markets last week, 51 percent more than her total during the previous week. Brown, meanwhile, aired 2,804 ads in the same markets, a 60 percent increase over the previous week.

In other campaigns across the nation:

• While Republican Carly Fiorina made a serious move in the advertising battle last week, Democratic incumbent Barbara Boxer still ran more ads overall. Boxer continues to receive good news in polling results for the California Senate race, driving positive online buzz.
• Alex Sink’s gubernatorial campaign in Florida ran only five total ads in Jacksonville and was silent in Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and West Palm Beach. Rick Scott, meanwhile, blanketed the airwaves with almost 1,400 total ads. But ads bought and aired by the Florida Democratic Party helped to balance out Scott’s message on the airwaves.
• While the latest public polls appear to be in Democratic Governor Martin O’Malley’s favor, Republican Bob Ehrlich accelerated his advertising buy last week as the campaign enters its final month.
• In Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senate race, Republican Pat Toomey increased his advertising lead last week over Democrat Joe Sestak. Support from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee is driving negative discussion about Toomey on-air, and help from the White House is propelling Sestak’s climb in online buzz.

Download Nielsen’s Campaign Media Analysis for more details on these and other contentious midterm political races.

Meanwhile in the race for Crist’s gubernatorial seat, Republican Rick Scott aired four times as many ads last week as his opponent Alex Sink (D). Both candidates aired their highest number of ads in the Tampa-St. Petersburg market, but the most obvious discrepancy came in the Miami market, where Scott’s campaign aired 344 ads as Sink’s campaign aired none.

In other high-profile races across the country:

• Meg Whitman led gubernatorial opponent Jerry Brown in overall advertising across the top four California media markets. But news that the former eBay CEO once employed an undocumented worker at her home drew a spike in online buzz and overall TV mentions on September 30.
• Carly Fiorina enjoyed her first full week advertising during the general election for California’s Senate seat. While Fiorina’s ads aired in Los Angeles, Sacramento, and San Diego, she still had yet to air an ad in the San Francisco market, through October 3. Overall, Democratic incumbent Barbara Boxer held a nearly 4-to-1 advertising advantage across the state last week.
• The Baltimore market is proving to be the biggest battleground in the Maryland governor’s race. Incumbent Martin O’Malley (D) and opponent Bob Ehrlich (R) were neck-and-neck in Charm City’s ad race, while Ehrlich showed no advertising activity at all in the Washington, DC market. As a result, the candidates’ names were more than twice as likely to be mentioned on local Baltimore television stations last week, compared to the DC airwaves.

Download Nielsen’s Campaign Media Analysis on these and other contentious mid-term political races.

Nielsen recorded an overall volume jump of 19 percent in August, with the major news publishers being the key beneficiaries of the increase in traffic.

Amongst the major news sites, Nine News saw the largest increase in mobile traffic in August, up 27 percent from July 2010. Fairfax Digital’s SMH and The Age mobile sites were up 21 percent and 18 percent respectively, while News Digital Media’s news.com.au increases 18 percent.

“The increasing ownership of smartphones and more affordable mobile data pricing plans have seen mobile Internet usage increase in recent months,” observes Matt Bruce, Managing Director of Nielsen’s online division in Australia. “This growth was given an extra jolt in August as Australians looked to mobile news sites via their mobile phones for updates on the election results and the subsequent negotiations with the Independents.”

Bruce notes that major spikes in mobile Internet usage to news sites were recorded on the day of the Federal Election and the day following (August 21 and 22), and then again on September 7 as the three Independents announced their decision, and the subsequent news that Labor had won the election.

In January, 48 million viewers watched the President’s first State of the Union speech.

China’s growth in online advertising continues at a quick pace, reaching 4.06 billion RMB in the first quarter of 2010—a 52.7% increase over the same period in 2009. This trend is expected to continue for the remainder of the year. The Fashion industry was the top spender, with almost 18% market share. Half of the top 10 industries lost market share in the first quarter.

China’s advertising market kept up a fast pace in the first quarter of 2010, after enjoying a 39% year-over-year growth for 2009. More than 3,600 advertisers in China advertised online during this time—an increase of 36.2% from Q1 2009.

This is a good start for the Chinese online advertising industry. Despite the difficult economic environment many countries struggled through last year, China enjoyed growth, and saw tremendous increases. As more advertisers step into the online market and advertisers regain their confidence, this trend of rapid growth should continue into the remainder of 2010.

The Fashion category was the biggest spender, with a 17.7% of total market share. It is also a fast-growing industry, with market share increasing 3.3%, compared to Q1 of 2009. This top 10 industry played a major role in Q1, representing 87.6% share of the entire markets’ advertising value. Among the top 10, Real Estate is the only one that dropped in advertising value compared to 2009, leading to a 4.7% drop in market share. There were four other industries that also lost market share in Q1: Entertainment (-2.3%), Employment (-1.6%), Automotive (-0.2%) and Media (-0.2%).

For more information, please visit www.cr-nielsen.com.

Viewership to President Obama’s first State of the Union was down 7% from President Bush’s first official State of the Union address on January 29, 2002, but up 5% from President Clinton’s first official address on January 25, 1994:

• Download a historical look at ratings for State of the Union Addresses.

Newsworthy Buzz
The President’s speech was among the most widely discussed topics so far in 2010, rising over the last few days, but still eclipsed by the immense social media and news activity surrounding the earthquake in Haiti. Big media stories such as the Apple iPad announcement (the same day as the State of the Union) and the recent Jay Leno/Conan O’Brien late night shakeup also drew notable buzz.