As digital marketing strengthens its grasp over the industry, it would be wise to remember the basics. And as the pull of technology gets more tempting, the message more than anything is still what matters. The best way to move forward, after all, is to take a step back.

In a nutshell, this was the sage advice John Sawyer, the chief strategy officer at the Grey Matter Group, dispelled at a seminar on interactive and digital marketing held during the recent inaugural Ad Fair 2008, Michigan Business reported.

“This enthusiasm about this new technology gets them going in a certain direction, and we find out later it wasn’t the right use of their resources,” said Sawyer. “They forget about their objectives or their marketing strategy.”

While digital marketing is a venue that companies must include today in their marketing plans, Sawyer said ad buyers and marketing directors need to avoid putting all of their spending into one area. Even in the digital age, a good strategy remains predicated on maintaining that critical mix of media buys, he said.

Sawyer cited data showing there are more than 17,000 magazine titles today, versus 8,400 in 1960, and 13,500 radio stations, about three times that of nearly five decades ago. The average household receives more than 82 television channels. In 1960, it got 5.7 channels. Those forms of traditional media exist amid millions of Web sites and billions of Web pages, Sawyer notes.

“We don’t want our clients to abandon traditional media,” he said, emphasizing that media has gone from mass market to niche markets. Yet it’s digital media that’s seeing the highest spending growth.

The Chicago-based Forrester Research estimated interactive marketing spending in the United States will more than triple by 2012, to $61 billion annually, representing a 27 percent compounded annual growth rate. Interactive marketing now accounts for eight percent of all ad spending. Forrester Research projects it will grow to 18 percent of ad budgets in five years. Here’s a look at the growth of various categories:

Search-engine marketing will grow to $25 billion a year by 2012 and experience a 26 percent annually compounded growth rate due to increasing costs of a paid search, more spending on optimizations tools and services, and global expansion.

Online display advertising will hit $14 billion by 2012.

E-mail marketing will grow to $4 billion by 2012, driven by services and integration.

Online video ads will grow significantly to $7.1 billion by 2012, a 72 percent increase.

Mobile marketing through personal devices will grow to $2.8 billion by 2012.