Three leading B2B trade companies have recently issued trading updates and quarterly results, and reported that online is delivering strong growth rates.

The Haymarket Business Media division of Haymarket Group reported 2006 online revenue growth of 41%; Centaur Media plc online is growing at an estimated 30%; and TechTarget reported second quarter 2007 online revenue grew 27%. All three exceeded Outsell's benchmark total average B2B Trade Publishing online revenue growth rate of 22%.

Online revenue can no longer be viewed as the troublesome junior partner to print revenue. It is becoming a major contributor to total company growth.

Centaur's estimated 2006 total revenue is GBP 82.3 million, ($167 million), with online revenue making up 19%. Therefore 30% online growth adds 5.7% to total company growth, or nearly half of the reported top line 12% revenue growth.

TechTarget reported second quarter revenue of $25 million and online accounted for 66% of that revenue. The 27% online growth rate equates to 17.8% growth contribution to the total company. That's practically all of the company's topline growth of 19%, indicating very slow growth for events and print at TechTarget in the second quarter of 2007.

In Outsell's Publishers and Information Providers market size and share database, preliminary results show that in 2006 in total for the $20 billion B2B trade publishing market:

• print revenues fell 3.6%
• online revenue grew 22%
• events grew 6.7%.

By comparison, these three companies all surpassed Outsell's benchmark average online growth rate for this segment. In Outsell's preliminary benchmark splits for the share of total revenue from different media, print accounts for 44.7%, online 28.3% and events 27% of the total 2006 B2B trade publishing revenue.

Online is now bringing in a bigger share of B2B trade publishing revenue than events. 

Outsell's data shows that in 2006, total B2B trade publishing revenue growth was 5.5% to $20.0 billion. The 5.5% consisted of negative 1.8% hit to total growth from print revenue declines (48.9% of total revenue in 2005, that fell 3.6%), exactly offset by 1.8% contribution to total growth from events (26.7% of total, that grew 6.7%). The net 5.5% total growth was from the 24.4% of total that was online in 2005 growing 22.3%, equal to total net company growth.