Data from IBOPE, a media and marketing research firm in Brazil, highlights a surge in advertising spending in its red-hot home market.

Total advertising spending in Brazil rose 15.8% to BRL88.32 billion ($52.89 billion) in 2011. Broken down by media, TV maintained a solid lead, increasing 15.3% to BRL46.38 billion ($27.77 billion), while internet advertising recorded the highest level of growth, 70.6%, to reach BRL5.39 billion ($3.23 billion) in spending. IBOPE acknowledged that its online advertising figure for 2011 includes search spending for the first time, which accounted for a large portion of the increase.

The firm, in a press release, estimated that spending increased the most in urban areas such as Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. It hypothesized that brands were increasing spending in booming cities to reach newly affluent and aspirational consumers.

eMarketer forecasts that there will be 86.4 million internet users in Brazil by the end of 2012, and they will be largely urban and upwardly mobile. The increase in online spending is indicative of brands trying to reach these consumers.