On Tuesday, we ran a news story about how marketers/businesses who have invested in online marketing and Web analytics are going to continue doing so. This, according to Jim Sterne, author of the report and founder of the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit (eMOS), is a testament to the fact that those who are using these tools are seeing results and standing by them.

The Association of National Advertisers concluded its “Masters of Marketing” conference two weeks ago (Oct. 16-19) and it, too, launched a survey to its attendees. Though this one captured a much wider audience (approx. 1,400 attendees comprised of marketers, analysts, and agencies), results still point to a similar conclusion — marketing budgets, in general, aren’t plummeting as much as everyone had feared, as long as they’re showing the numbers (and the money). In fact, BtoB magazine will be hosting a Webcast tomorrow where Stefan Tournquist, Research Director at MarketingSherpa, “explains why cutting budgets in a tight economy may be a shortsighted approach.”

Check out the survey and results after the jump, as well as a few words from Barbara Bacci Mirque, executive vice president at the ANA.

How will you adjust your current marketing and media plans to account for the recent downturn in the financial markets?
Spending will be reduced (33%)
Spending will be constant / marketing mix will be reallocated (33%)
Surprisingly, we will spend more (27%)
No changes, we will keep everything status quo (8%)

How does your CEO view your marketing efforts with respect to growth?
As a brand-building investment (56%)
As an unaccountable but necessary expense (21%)
Not sure (15%)
As an unnecessary expense (8%)

What is your preferred social media site for driving brand growth?
None (32 percent)
YouTube (20 percent)
Facebook (18 percent)
All (12 percent)
LinkedIn (10 percent)
MySpace (6 percent)
Twitter (3 percent)

As you look toward 2009, how much do you plan to spend on marketing vs. 2008?
Increase spending more than 10 percent (26 percent)
Increase spending less than 10 percent (13 percent)
Hold stable (28 percent)
Decrease spending less than 10 percent (14 percent)
Decrease spending more than 10 percent (19 percent)

Which discipline will offer your brand the largest opportunity for growth?
Traditional 30-second spots (17 percent) — still v. popular — decrease?
One page advertisements in a newspaper/magazine (7 percent)
Web advertising (16 percent)
Social media integration (28 percent)
Direct Marketing (7 percent)
Grassroots, viral public relations (19 percent)
Radio (5 percent)

How does your company currently measure brand growth?
Sales and net income (70 percent)
Third-party brand-equity valuations (15 percent)
Shareholder value (9 percent)
Household penetration (4 percent)
Company culture (3 percent)

While 33 percent is certainly no small percentage, it’s comforting to know that at least 60 percent of respondents are dedicated to at least reallocating their budgets, if not increasing them. The key, Mirque says, is an emphasis on being accountable. “If you can’t account for what you’re doing, if there’s no accountability program in place, if you can’t say, ‘I know that [cutting the budget will] going to impact the business by X percent,’ ” Mirque says, “then it’s easy for [CEOs and CFOs] to cut it.”

Particularly during recessionary times, when others are cutting, “if you can go out and capture higher share of voice, you’ll actually have better long term effects,” she says.

While marketers may be worried that they’ll be the first to be cut, Mirque says that she’s seen evidence that suggests quite the opposite. Year after year, as marketers base their results on measurement, CEOs and CFOs are coming around and understanding that marketing is not an expense, rather, that it is, in fact, critical to the business.  “Marketing has increased in stature of the years,” she adds, precisely because it’s proving its return on investment. “If you can begin to speak in the language of the boardroom, then marketing is going to get a lot more respect.”

Mirque cites commercials during the dotcom days when companies were throwing money around like that was their business. E*Trade’s Super Bowl campaign (1999), for instance, featured a monkey wearing an E*Trade T-shirt dancing with two old men. At the end read the lines, “Well, we just wasted 2 million bucks. What are you doing with your money?” — “That’s probably not going to build one’s business…,” she says. “They just threw stuff up on TV and it wasn’t impactful, it didn’t build a brand. If you’re doing that kind of stuff, yea, you’re going to get cut.”