Through a Freedom of Information (FOI) request, The Drum has learned that the Scottish Government spent a total of £19,813,078.25 excluding VAT on media buying through its marketing services framework between January 2009 and January 2010.

The media buying is handled by MediaCom Scotland, the Scottish Government’s appointed media buying and planning agency, which worked across the marketing Framework which includes Government bodies such as NHS 24, Visit Scotland, Historic Scotland and Scottish Enterprise, among others.

Domestic traditional routes were still the most popular over those 12 months with the most being spent on television at £4,454,140.62, press at £3,591,828.09, cinema with £1,044,650.99 and outdoor with £2,798,232.09.

A total spend for digital marketing with the addition of online and search budgets totalled £2, 699,253.50 with online spend at £2,345,717.60 and search at £353,535.90 ahead of radio spend which totalled £2,584,579.24 with radio spend at £2,082,011.80 and radio promotions costing £502,577.90.

International spend during the year of Homecoming totaled £1,313,178.42 across international online, press, TV and other forms of communications.

The Scottish Government was the largest media buyer on the framework with £8,369,694.78 last year, while Visit Scotland was the second highest with a spend of £4,942,519.99 and Scottish Development International third with £1,934,976.63 in total.

The Drum has previously learned through an FOI request, that The Scottish Government spent over £5million through its Marketing Services Framework last year.