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Measurement

June 26, 2008

NBC to Offer Show-Specific Data on Streamed Content

NBC Digital Entertainment will begin offering demographic data on individual shows streamed on its site. NBC.com's show-specific will be provided courtesy of Nielsen Online's VideoCensus beginning in July.

Digital Media Sales SVP Peter Naylor said advertisers have been requesting the show-level data. NBCU claims it's the network to carry Nielsen's tags on its streaming video content. How long before CBS, ABC, Fox and Hulu begin offering similar granular visibility into their online video audiences?

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June 24, 2008

How Will Google Ad Planner Promote Network Inventory?

In his presentation at the ARF Measurement conference yesterday, Wayne Lin, business product manager at Google, stuck mainly to what the company had already announced about Ad Planner, its new audience research and media planning product.

Things got a little more interesting during the Q&A, when someone in the audience asked him how Google would promote sites in its own network. It was the first time Google has addressed its conflict of interest with the free tool. Lin said he believed the right approach is to follow the formula it used for organic versus paid listings in search.

"If we do benefit sites in our network, we should clearly label that," he said.

It's interesting to note he said the company "should," not that it "would," disclose properties its peddling. Keep an eye on this aspect of Ad Planner.

Designed for media planners, Ad Planner alllows its users to save their media plans or export them as a DoubleClick MediaVisor file. It uses the same data sources as the company's new Google Trends for Websites measurement play -- which is to say it pulls from search data, Google Analytics data, panel data and third party market research. (In retrospect, it was obvious what Google had in mind when it recently began asking Analytics users to specify whether their site data could be shared anonymously with its other apps.)

Lin said Google is now weighing whether to pursue Media Ratings Council accreditation, which would validate its measurement approach. One audience member called it "regrettable" that some firms had sought to create reliable audience estimates by fusing together different databases willy-nilly.

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May 28, 2008

Measuring Engagement: What Does It Mean?

Lots of people in digital marketing are promoting the concept of tracking engagement -- instead of giving credit to the last ad clicked on a Web site.

But what exactly does "engagement" mean? That question was posed to a panel at the American Association of Advertising Agencies' digital conference today in New York City.

And, if David Smith, chief executive of MediaSmith, had his way, he'd head back to the drawing board -- or Webster's.

Keep in mind, it's been three years since Advertising Research Foundation first promoted the concept of measuring "engagement." And Microsoft backs it in a big way, calling its approach, "engagement mapping."

Trouble is, Smith said: "Engagement is more of a concept. It's such a common word. We use it everyday to describe what a campaign is doing -- when we are not talking about a metric at all."

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May 13, 2008

Epic Intros View-Through-Like Metric

You've heard of induced labor. Now there are "induced visits!" At least that's what Epic Advertising, formerly Azoogle Ads, claims it can measure with its new Performance CPM metric. According to the company, an “induced” site visit is one resulting "in any way from an ad," even if there's no direct click-through. The metric also considers CPC, CPM and CPA tracking and brand impact.

Being a performance marketing firm, Epic serves direct-response advertisers who pay on a cost-per-click or per-action basis. It looks as though the company may now want to branch out by better serving brand marketers, or perhaps by demonstrating that there's value even if an ad isn't clicked.

This "new" metric reminds me quite a bit of something developed by DoubleClick years ago, called view-through. That metric gauges user activity after a user has been exposed to an ad but hasn't clicked on it.

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May 6, 2008

Calculate the Value of a Widget -- in a Widget

Thank DoubleClick for this nifty tool: a widget that calculates the value of a widget.

Google's Ari Paparo, previously DoubleClick's VP, advertiser products, brought it to marketers' attention yesterday at IAB's digital video leadership forum. He participated on the panel, "Format Wars No More."

When asked if brands will start tracking mentions on Twitter, Ning, and other social applications, Paparo pointed out that tracking is fairly easy to do.

But assigning value to that chatter is tough. Paparo likened it to attending a party, picking up business cards, and then trying to attach a dollar value to that experience.

Sounds like a good candidate for another widget calculator.

Posted by Anna Maria Virzi at 7:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 30, 2008

When Failure Is the ROI Goal

Shouldn't marketing be more than just going through the motions?

Over coffee the other day, one of the top e-mail consultants in the country told me about a surprise revelation from a client, one of the major broadband providers in the country.

She's charged with an e-mail retention program aimed at the telco's broadband subscribers. So naturally you'd think that the more subscribers who re-upped their annual contracts, the better the program was performing, right?

Not so fast.

In a recent meeting, the client let drop that subscribers who don't renew their DSL contracts are charged higher monthly fees, and that the majority of lapsed subscribers simply don't notice the rise in costs. "So," my friend incredulously asked her client, "you're telling me that the more this program doesn't work, the more money you make?"

"Well...yes," came the reply.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 23, 2008

What Time Is It in the Cloud?

These days, my head is in the cloud.

More and more companies are rolling out cloud computing solutions and applications. On the consumer level, it's getting easier and easier for documents, spreadsheets, e-mail, calendars, presentations, you name it, to live in the ether somewhere above the hard drive, always on and always accessible.

Way cool, and an emerging opportunity for advertisers and marketers to push relevant, contextual messages to cloud computing users.

But what time is it in the cloud? I'm wondering this as I shuttle between the East and West coasts, wielding a battery of BlackBerry, mobile phone, and the laptop I'm using to access the book I'm writing entirely on Google Docs (not a word of the manuscript is on my hard drive).

Some of these devices are set to the time zone I'm actually in, others are set to the one I live in. So how's an advertiser to know what's relevant messaging? Should an ad be pushed for a business or service in Sonoma (where I'm speaking today), or New York (where I live?). Does the cloud know if I'm working at lunchtime or at dinnertime?

Geo- and daypart targeting has long been used in traditional as well as interactive marketing. When life literally shifts to online -- as users move into the cloud -- how will this element of targeting be achieved?

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 9:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 22, 2008

Another Day, Another Interactive Ad Group

Just when you thought there were enough interactive advertising task forces, councils, and advisory groups, here's the latest.

Break Media, an online community for men and an ad network, has decided there's more to life -- and business -- than hot women, gear, and gossip. That includes the all mighty dollar and figuring out how to calculate online video advertising's return on investment.

The company, which operates sites such as Chickipedia (a wiki of hot women) and Cage Potato (Mixed Martial Arts news), announced today it's taking the lead to form a council to examine the effectiveness of online video ads.

Online Video Advertising ROI Council is represented by some high-profile brands, agencies, and technology vendors. (The new media company made the announcement today at the historic 21 Club in midtown Manhattan. Jacket required.)

Break chief executive Keith Richman, in an interview, said traditional advertisers want assurances that money spent on online video ads is beneficial. Before that can occur, advertisers must reach some agreement on what metrics to use to help with that assessment.

The advertising ROI council members include Ogilvy One, truTV, National Geographic Channel, AT&T, Starcom, eMarketer , Panache, Lotame, Visible Measures, Horizon Media, and Initiative Media. It also brought in Visible Measures, to help establish metrics to determine ROI and intends to meet every three months to share information among its membership.

The council's formation comes just as the IAB is updating digital video ad format guidelines for in-stream, overlay, and video companion ads. That undertaking is intended to simplify ad specs plus other goals.

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March 31, 2008

Are TV Networks Measuring What Counts?

Alan Wurtzel, NBC's president of research and media development, is presenting research at the ARF Re:Think conference essentially in defense of network TV. He's claiming TV viewing hasn't decreased as a resut of the Web, rather that people are absorbing more media simultaneously as they multitask.

He's also showing eye-tracking scans taken of views as they fast-forward through :30 spots on DVRs. The graphics are supposed to indicate these viewers concentrate more intently on the center of the screen as the ads whiz by, indicating there's no real conscious absorption of the ad message, but there's nevertheless an unconscious message being conveyed.

This sounds dubious. Sure, networks are bound to conduct research in their own interests -- why wouldn't they? But the message coming through from Wurtzel (who's still talking) is that while consumers certainly are still watching TV, they're significantly less focused on it. In fact, they may even be most intent on the set when they're trying to avoid something rather than watch it.

This raises questions about engagement, something the ARF is still working to define.

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March 13, 2008

Interactive TV Not Measuring Up

Interactive television won't succeed until cable companies reach agreement on measurement standards, said two Starcom MediaVest executives.

An initiative undertaken by six major cable companies, called Canoe, is a step in the right direction, said Jen Soch, MediaVest USA's VP and director of advanced TV.

Tracey L. Scheppach, vice president/video innovation director at Starcom USA, said flaws include video-on-demand's poor navigation and an inability to insert ads dynamically.

Unless these shortcomings are addressed, Soch and Scheppach warned that advertising dollars would move into broadband. Both spoke today at day two of the McGraw-Hill Media Summit in New York City.

Problem is, the more things change, the more they stay the same. That's because interactive TV's promise hasn't been fulfilled for at least three decades.

Expressing a little more optimism was Scott Brown, SVP, strategic relations, marketing/technology at Nielsen. The media measurement firm is working with Charter Communications to obtain and resell anonymous digital set-top box (STB) data for analyzing and measuring audience. That venture, announced yesterday, involves TV viewers in Los Angeles.

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February 29, 2008

ComScore Weighs in on Google Click Volume Debacle Sparked by Its Data

Earlier this week, when comScore set off a GOOG selling frenzy on Wall Steet with data showing click rate growth had flattened, I called the research firm for comment but to no avail. Amazing what 48 hours can bring. After a continued outcry, comScore has now issued a lengthy statement with additional data and charts (previously unavailable to non-clients) arguing, basically, that everyone should just calm down. Here's the money quote:

While we do not claim that these concerns are unwarranted, we believe a careful analysis of our search data does not lend them direct support. More specifically, the evidence suggests that the softness in Google’s paid click metrics is primarily a result of Google’s own quality initiatives that result in a reduction in the number of paid listings and, therefore, the opportunity for paid clicks to occur.

ComScore also shared the following chart, which demonstrates that click rates declined for much of last year, long before economic fears began bleeding into the nation's collective consciousness. It also shows how ad coverage, defined as the percentage of queries that display at least one ad, has declined roughly in parallel to click volume growth.

So you see, comScore says, Google is pumping fewer ads to its users and receiving fewer clicks in return. ComScore theorizes that reduction will be counterbalanced by an increase in revenue per query under the click quality initiative

On a separate but related note, agency heavy SearchIgnite has said it's seen none of the click volume declines described by comScore data, nor revenue shortfalls either. The agency, which claims to represent $200 million in search spending, said ad impressions for the first six weeks of 2008 were up 79.5 percent year over year, while paid clicks were up 47.2 percent. Additionally, ad spending on Google grew by 40.1 percent among the same group of clients (In other words the data doesn't include new business).

SearchIgnite's research should not be considered representative of the search industry at large, as it's just one agency with a defined group of clients who all share one thing in common: they follow SearchIgnite's advice. But then, can comScore's data be treated as really representative of consumers' click behaviors? After all, the company was seriously challenged by the IAB last year, and publishers of all stripes love to take potshots at its audience and traffic estimates.

My take continues to be that while the click rate fall-off is not necessarily the result of a lack of consumer confidence, a lack of confidence is bound to result in a reduction in click volume. More succinctly: No, Google's not insulated from a recession and no, comScore's findings are not (necessarily) a bad sign.

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February 26, 2008

Quote of the Day: Microsoft/Atlas "Engagement Mapping"

"The cynic in me isn’t surprised that Microsoft’s got a long line of agencies waiting to test this stuff, since it justifies spending more money on ads with crap click-through and conversion rates even when the real purchases are coming from a keyword buy on a competitor’s search engine [keywords]. But the basic argument -- some people see an ad and then decide to act later -- seems sound. I just don’t know what proportion of users do this, vs. the ones that just didn’t notice the earlier ads. After all, if you know a user’s browser loaded four of your banners without results, but then the user clicked on a fifth, you still don’t know much."

-Greg Yardley, writing on his blog about Engagement Mapping, Microsoft's new approach to gauging impact and optimizing spend for ad impressions across search and display ads. (See ClickZ's earlier coverage.)

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February 13, 2008

Ogilvy Data Honcho Flies to Draft

Ogilvy's data and analytics guru of seven years, Ira Helf, has made like a tree and, uh, leaved. He'll join Draftfcb as EVP and executive director of data and analytics. He's the second senior exec with major digital responsibilities to quit Ogilvy in recent weeks, after e-mail head Jeanniey Mullen bolted to take the top marketing spot at Zinio.

At Draft, Helf will report to New York President Peter DeNunzio, who told me yesterday the role is not limited to digital channels, but will oversee data and reporting needs "from upfront work on segmentation and modeling to campaign... metrics on the back end." Helf's bio credits him from expanding Ogilvy's analytics practice from its focus on digital and direct into brand advertising and events marketing.

The two departures at Ogilvy follow a round of January layoffs that were at least partly the result of client demand for digital expertise. I have it on good information that at least one other female digital exec, this one from Neo@Ogilvy, is also on the way out or has already left. If you know who that might be, please shoot me an e-mail.

Update: Ogilvy makes a hire of its own. Marc Fleishhacker just joined Ogilvy New York from Digitas. He'll be senior partner and managing director of Ogilvy's marketing technology consulting practice, overseeing the new Sears/Kmart bidness.

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February 11, 2008

WPP Acquires Stake Web Analytics firm NuConomy

WPP announced today that it has acquired a stake in Israeli Web analytics company NuConomy, although it would not reveal how big a stake it has or how much it was worth.

The NuConomy platform appears to be in beta, judging from the company's Web site, but claims to "measure consumers' engagement and interaction with content, while giving advertisers actionable insight into the audience they engage with."

The acquisition follows a handful of recent WPP investments in digital media firms, including Integrated Media Measurement Inc., VideoEgg, SpotRunner and Dutch interactive agency LaCommunidad. Rumors that it would make a move to acquire the outstanding share of SpotRunner have been circulating for months, with no new developments.

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February 7, 2008

Web Analytics and Your Tax Dollars

You'd think cash-strapped government agencies that operate Web sites would jump at the availability of free and very robust tools such as Google Analytics.

Think again.

Earlier this week, I was on a fascinating call with the people who run many of the major federal government Web sites. The group included one woman who does the same for a state agency. We mostly talked metrics, and what measurements to consider when gauging the performance of sites that are non-commercial in nature -- like theirs.

Given the budgetary constraints these sites operate under, we spent a good deal of time discussing free (and very low cost), Web-based measurement tools, such as Alexa.com, Compete.com, and Quantcast. And, of course, Google Analytics.

That's when the woman from the state agency spoke up. Because her site represents a state government, and because hers is not the state of California, she cannot use Google Analytics on the site she operates. Why? Google's TOS, which specify "This Agreement shall be governed by and construed under the laws of the state of California..."

That's why at least one state agency is paying for (an admittedly more robust) commercial analytics package.

OK, so it's not $3.1 trillion in defense spending. But still.

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WPP's GroupM Acquires Majority Stake in Social Media Agency

WPP's GroupM announced today that it has acquired 75 percent of the share capital of LaCommunidad, the Dutch interactive agency behind imaginatively named viral tracking technology, ViralTracker.

LaCommunidad specializes in viral and social media campaigns, and has worked with big name European brands including ebay, Ford, and Dutch Airline KLM. According to a release today, the investment "continues WPP's strategy of strengthening its capabilities in digital media."

WPP recently acquired a minority stake in U.S.-based Integrated Media Measurement Inc., the developer of an end-to-end media measurement system that links media exposure to consumer action.

However, rumors of a more significant ad-related investment have been circulating since last September. One possible target is rumored to be SpotRunner, an Internet agency offering localized Web and TV ads for small businesses, in which WPP already owns a small stake.

Posted by Jack Marshall at 12:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 31, 2008

TiVo Tracks Another Network

CBS became the second network to sign up for TiVo's Stop||Watch service. The broadcaster will have access to second-by-second measurement of program and commercial ratings for live and time-shifted viewing. NBC partnered with TiVo in December around the time of the DVR provider's earnings call. Networks are looking for more measurability in both broadcast and online formats as capabilities arise. The online counterpart of tracking viewing behavior, VisibleSuite was discussed at DEMO this week.

Posted by Enid Burns at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 16, 2008

Compete Gets Into Competitive Ad Tracking

Compete, a Web site measurement and competitive analytics firm, has come out with an a new ad performance analytics tool called Ad Analyzer. The offering promises to track campaign impact for its clients and their competitors within specified customer segments. Most Ad Analyzer customers will focus on the competitive data, since the bulk of ad tracking and serving systems out there let them measure the effectiveness of their own ads and landing pages.

Here's a rundown of the specific data Ad Analyzer promises to track, pulled directly from the press release:

* Share of unique visitors continuing on to the brand’s site, vs. leaving, after seeing the landing page
* Click-and-return rate - Share of unique visitors returning to the brand’s site within 30 days of seeing the landing page
* Funnel entry - Share of unique visitors to a landing page that enter the online shopping cart or online application process
* Offline Lead: - Share of unique visitors to a landing page referred to the brand offline
* Order submission - Share of unique visitors to a landing page who submit an order or form in the same quarter

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 4, 2008

The Seedy Side of Sears

Over the holiday season, Sears.com and Kmart.com customers got an added bonus: tracking software many experts classify as spyware. Computer Associates Senior Researcher Benjamin Googins was asked to join MY SHC Community and through detailed reporting, determined the procedure failed to give users proper notice of what they were doing. Ultimately, Sears had users opt-in to install comScore tracking software. Further research was conducted by Ben Edelman, who contacted Sears and got a response about how SHC "goes through great lengths to describe the tracking aspect." To which Edelman states, "I emphatically disagree."

In a period where Web audience measurement is under scrutiny, it's surprising to see the terms and conditions obfuscated when installing tracking software on user machines, if that is what Sears is, in fact, doing. Edelman alleges the practice is in violation of FTC rulings.

Further digging by Edelman uncovered another issue on Sears' managemyhome.com site. Once logged into the site, he discovered users can look up the purchase history of other managemyhome.com members. When I tried to visit the Web site, it wouldn't load. I'm unsure whether the site is having issues, or if it's been taken down due to these findings.

Sears did not respond to a phone call requesting comment on either matter.

Posted by Enid Burns at 4:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

December 12, 2007

Romney Ran on Other Gay Sites: Story Prompts Major Nielsen Data Revision

Last month, The New York Times reported the campaign for Republican presidential primary contender Mitt Romney ran thousands of ad impressions on Gay.com in August. It turns out, apparently a result of ad network targeting or lack thereof, the campaign also ran about 5,000 display ads on other gay-centric sites Advocate.com and PlanetOut. That's according to Nielsen Online AdRelevance.

When I first read the Times piece, I was puzzled. After all, I'd sifted through AdRelevance data for the same period as part of ClickZ's ongoing Campaign '08 coverage back in September. Had I overlooked this juicy detail about Romney's ads when AdRelevance sent me the August data?

Nope. After contacting Nielsen Online, I learned that the August information on political advertisers they'd originally sent me, which did not list Romney as an advertiser, had since been revised to include the Romney ads. Those updates were prompted by inquiries for The New York Times story, they said.

But it didn't end there. Incomplete data from AdRelevance had found its way into six stories published by ClickZ between April and September of this year. What follows is a detailed description of how I became aware of the data discrepancies.

Obama Ads Uncovered Along with Other Discrepancies

According to the original data, the only presidential campaign in the "political advertisers" category in August was John McCain 2008. However, the new data showed in addition to the uncovered Romney ads, Democratic Senator Barack Obama's campaign also ran display ads that month.

These revelations were disconcerting for me as a reporter. Not only have I received AdRelevance data on political campaigns for years now, I've developed a new ClickZ Campaign '08 News sub-section devoted to covering digital ad and marketing efforts by the 2008 presidential campaigns.

At ClickZ News, we pride ourselves on getting our reporting right, but when it comes to tracking online ads in any cohesive manner, we're only as good as the data we're provided. Political campaigns, particularly national ones, typically are very reluctant to share any information about their tactics, including their online ad buys. And Nielsen Online is the only measurement firm out there that tracks online display ads run by political advertisers in any regular, quantifiable manner that will supply this information to ClickZ.

Keep in mind, I realize information provided by Nielsen and others is not always 100 percent accurate, and when I've been aware of data gaps, I've made note of it. For instance, when covering July presidential campaign ads, I wrote that although AdRelevance did not report them, "PointRoll expandable video banners for Senator Barack Obama have been spotted around the Web this month, including on UnionLeader.com, where early primary voters in New Hampshire reading the Manchester-based newspaper site would be sure to catch them."

The Flood Gates Open

And what about previous months? I'd been reporting on AdRelevance data on the presidential campaigns since April. It didn't take long to learn the research firm had revised its data on political advertisers for previous months, too, but ClickZ had never been notified. It seems as though the errors would have lived in perpetuity on ClickZ had I not investigated the August Romney data discrepancies.

ClickZ recently was provided with updates of all revised data we originally reported between April and September; changes in the process for compiling and reporting on political ads were reflected in data provided to ClickZ for October. After receiving updates, I found the original information was off by a little or a lot each month, in some cases missing millions of ad impressions or skipping campaigns for presidential candidates entirely, such as Barack Obama, John Edwards, and Romney.

"These are the types of feedback that we value… to continually evolve our service," said Jason Lee, senior project manager for AdRelevance in reference to a discussion I had with him a few weeks ago about the situation.

Lee and his colleague, Jon Gibs, VP of media analytics for Nielsen Online, helped me understand what went wrong and why. "I think it has to do with the protocols we have set up for categorizing advertisers in general," said Lee. "In the case of political advertisers, those protocols and rules may not have been flexible enough."

In a nutshell, the AdRelevance system determines the sites it will monitor based on weekly traffic numbers. After intercepting ads running on those sites, the ads are categorized by a classification team. These are the folks who decide an ad run by John McCain 2008 or Obama for America goes in the "political advertisers" category as opposed to the auto or CPG category.

In the case of the Obama campaign ads missed in initial reports for August and other months, Lee explained, "A human did likely see the ad…. For some reason or another it slipped through the cracks."

In the cases of ads that were ignored the first time around, most likely what happened is they simply weren't classified, said Gibs. "We set up what we think is a very good system to track major advertisers," he stressed, noting AdRelevance was originally designed to track big commercial advertisers -- the Fords and AT&Ts of the world. "Because political flighting was very small in the beginning, it wasn't fully on our radar screen," he added.

"During this particular campaign season there's a lot more scrutiny, and a lot more attention being paid to what the campaigns are doing online," said Lee. Note, I've been receiving and reporting on political campaign ad data from AdRelevance for years now.

"Going forward we're confident the data should be where it is now if not at a higher point" in terms of quality, Lee told me.

The Politics of Data

Political advertising is a beast unto itself. Understanding the difference, for instance, between Congressman Ron Paul's campaign running ads and the Americans United for Freedom PAC running ads on his behalf will come about "by process of experience" for AdRelevance's classification team, Lee said.

The reality is, in politics as in just about anything else, polling and other forms of measurement are prone to error. In the end, the best ClickZ can do is update our own reporting with the correct information, as well as do everything possible to vet that information. Because we can't go back in time and see whether an ad ran on a particular site, nor can we here in NYC be served ads targeted to people living in Des Moines or people with different demographic characteristics or browsing histories, we are limited in our ability to ensure data are flawless.

Still, as online political marketing becomes more widespread, it's important for its evolution to be chronicled. That's my goal with previous political ad coverage in ClickZ News and our Campaign '08 coverage. So, even when there are bumps along the campaign reporting trail, we believe it makes more sense to continue reporting these data even if sometimes they're not perfect.

We also look forward to working with Nielsen Online and other measurement firms to continue improving the information available on online political campaigns. It's a learning process for everyone, most of all the political campaigns themselves.

Lee affirmed this, noting, "Online advertising is obviously constantly evolving. It's our goal is to consistently evolve our product to keep in step with that."

For details on revised AdRelevance data for the months of April through September, check out the original stories, which have all been updated:
April 2007
May 2007
June 2007
July 2007
August 2007
September 2007

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December 5, 2007

Nielsen Tracks TV Content on the Web through Digital Watermarks

Though a partnership with Digimarc, Nielsen will use digital watermarking and fingerprinting in online content to provide reporting, and tracking on copyrighted materials. The digital watermarking service is called Nielsen Digital Media Manager.

In addition to tracking for copyright security and compliance, the watermark allows clients to realize the value of their digital content, promote the expansion of Internet-distirbuted media, and facilitate a number of revenue streams. Those include ad-pairing, e-commerce, royalty reporting. Nielsen plans to start by tracking TV content online, but expects to expand to other online content categories and media types.

"We started with TV because we already do the necessary encoding - or watermarking - when we measure TV ratings. The last thing a video stream sees before it leaves a TV station is a Nielsen encoder that puts a digital code on the programming that our home meters can read. That same code can be used to measure TV programming when it is posted on the Internet," said Nielsen company spokesperson Gary Holmes.

News of the Digital Media Manager offering was broken earlier today by The Wall Street Journal (link, subscription required). However the article focused more on piracy prevention than content measurement. The article accuses Nielsen of being late to the game and "in some ways at a disadvantage to its rivals." Though digital watermarks are widely used for copyright protection on digital media, the tracking and ad-pairing components are not a standard feature.

"There are a lot of smaller companies that would like to deliver tracking services but none of them have the system in place to encode all TV programming," said Holmes. "That is why Nielsen is so well-positioned to break the logjam between the content providers and the distributors. Content providers have been reluctant to allow their content to appear on Web sites because they would lose control over it. This new service would give them control and make them more likely to agree to posting on the Web."

On Nielsen's radar for the Digital Media Manager product are media companies, social networks, peer-to-peer services, and user-generated content sites.

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November 1, 2007

The Digestible Data Package

Data is a fact of necessity for advertisers and marketers, yet it's expensive for some of the small shops to afford subscriptions, or shell out for full reports. San Francisco-based Media-Screen recognized the issue and launched Netpop Research, "a tiered subscription model for access to graphs that are borne out of our Netpop ongoing studies," said Josh Crandall, managing director of Media-Screen.

Subscriptions access consumer behavior data for $24.95 to $999.95 per month payable through PayPal. The subscription grants access to a research catalog, and subscribers get a number of credits to redeem each month. The low end gets access to five graphs per month, and the higher level gets access to 1,000 graphs per month. Higher-level subscriptions also allow users access to competitive landscape data.

Media-Screen's ongoing Netpop research has tackled topics including profiling broadband user personalities and mobile Web adoption. In addition to the graphs and competitive landscape data, Media-Screen will still make research reports available on an ad-hoc basis.

Netpop won't replace comScore and Nielsen data on audience measurement, but it works to "triangulate a marketer's analysis of the marketplace," said Crandall.

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October 31, 2007

Worldwide Mobile Subscriber Forecast

Data released by the Shosteck Group and its strategic partner the Mobile World forecasts 3.3 billion mobile subscribers worldwide by year end. Of those subscribers, roughly 2.6 billion are served by GSM, GPRS, and EDGE networks; 190 million operate on W-CDMA networks; and 422 million on CDMA2000 standards. The remaining few use technologies such as iDEN. By 2011 the research anticipates 5.4 billion mobile subscribers globally. The breakdown will be roughly 2.8 billion on GSM, GPRS, and EDGE networks; 1.8 billion on W-CDMA; and 783 million on CDMA2000.

Posted by Enid Burns at 2:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 29, 2007

New and Returning Clickstream

Hitwise today enhanced its clickstream reporting to include competitive intelligence on new and returning visitors. While you might get this data for your own site from a Web metrics package, access to competing sites, partner sites, or publishers you're looking to advertise on isn't automatically available. The data lets you understand the strategy and effectiveness of competitive marketing programs to see if competitors are more focused on traffic-driving campaigns versus retention; identify where new and returning visitors go after visiting a Web site, which can reduce churn if used effectively; and analyze a competitor's audience in terms of new and repeat traffic.

Posted by Enid Burns at 2:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

October 23, 2007

Habeas 'E-Mail Insecurity Factor' Findings

This week Habeas released the results to a study on e-mail study on e-mail, in which it found a certain e-mail insecurity factor among Internet users. Don't worry; e-mail is still one of the more relied-upon communication channels, particularly online. However consumers segregate communications among multiple accounts depending on trust factors in an effort to filter spam and other security threats. Habeas plans to present its findings and a detailed report in a Webinar, "Multichannel Revolution, How Web 2.0 and Online Reputation Changes Strategy and Results," on November 13 at 2:00 p.m. EST/11:00 a.m. PST. You can register for the Webinar here.

Posted by Enid Burns at 5:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 28, 2007

comScore and NetRatings Race to Audit Finish Line

Following a self-aggrandizing press release from Nielsen//NetRatings in which the measurement firm boasted that it's leading the Media Rating Council accreditation process, its competitor comScore has just announced that it will indeed go through with a full MRC audit. It had been in the pre-audit phase till now.

Sure, the IAB has cracked the whip on these guys to get their systems and methodologies audited, but does this really need to be a race?

Posted by Kate Kaye at 1:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Will Tech Tools Strangle Online Ad Growth?

Will the online advertising and marketing industry be held back by a shortage of people who possess the right mix of creative and quantitative skills? That was the assessment of some practitioners at Advertising Week in New York City.

ClickZ posed that question to Laura Thieme, president of Bizresearch, a Worthington, OH, consultancy specializing in search marketing. She recognizes challenges in finding talent, but says the industry's growing pains can be attributed to other factors -- especially technology.

The biggest obstacle? "The sheer number of [software] tools that exist," she said in a telephone interview this week. "Considering the tools that are getting updated, the acquisitions that are occurring or the new platforms getting rolled out, quite frankly, an analytic or IT [information technology] person would find it difficult to keep up with change," she said.

To quantity the problem, Thieme and her team identified the tools used to service the firm's top five accounts. Guess what? For a single account, they work with as many as 27 tools.

Of the 27, about seven to 10 were productivity tools such as Excel. The rest? Web site analytics, social media tracking, HTML authoring and paid search tools.

On Thieme's wish list: tools that allow for better or easier integration of data. It's difficult, she said, to analyze the results from a search campaign if you cannot easily compare the data collected by other tools. "You can tag your campaign. You can get it to work with LivePerson or ClickTracks, but oh gosh, that's one more integration that we'll put on the tech project list," she said, providing one scenario.

On the talent front, Thieme said the firm has a rigorous hiring and testing process. "We have found you can get creative people to gravitate toward analytics," she said. In instances where a talented creative person cannot master analytics, Thieme might still hire her but won't put her in charge of a major campaign.

To ensure that marketing students learn about the latest in Web analytics and search, Thieme teaches a class on the topic at Ohio State University. Of the 26 students in the class, three got jobs with Bizresearch and one went to work in interactive as an intern at P&G.

Posted by Anna Maria Virzi at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 25, 2007

IAB Calls Slowing Online Ad Spending Growth "Torrid"

Online ad spending has grown at "a torrid pace," 26.8 percent, during the first half of this year over the same period last year, Randall Rothenberg told a packed crowd at the Interactive Advertising Bureau's MIXX conference in New York yesterday. The IAB prez said spending hit the $10 billion milestone in the first half. "This is the first time in history this has happened," he gushed.

When the IAB reported numbers for the first half of '06 from its regular online ad spending report (conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers), it pegged spending at $7.9 billion, a 37 percent increase over the same period the year before.

Sure, nobody's saying 26.8 percent growth isn't moving at a fast clip, but during the first half of last year it grew 10 percent more over the previous year.

As reported here last week, though the reports would have us believe that online spending is scorching, it might be smart to temper that a bit, considering both Nielsen and TNS also reported slowing Web ad spending growth during the first half of '07 compared to that period of '06. Yes, it's becoming bigger piece of the overall ad spending pie, but the fact is, all three of these measures -- IAB, Nielsen and TNS -- show spending growth has dwindled since last year at this time.

Taking into consideration the IAB counts a variety of online ad forms including the monster that is search, in addition to just display ads like TNS and Nielsen do, this is an important caveat.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 10:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 24, 2007

Internet Broadcasting: Traffic on the Rise to Local TV Station Sites

Traffic to TV station Web sites just experienced two consecutive record-setting months, according to data released today by Internet Broadcasting, which supports local publishers like NBC, Cox Television and Meredith Broadcasting. IB's site partners saw 15.8 million unique visitors in July, followed by 16.7 million in August, according to Nielsen//NetRatings, handily beating the previous record of 15.4 million visitors recorded last February. Page views in July were over a half-billion for the first time.

The firm said the record traffic was driven by weather-related events and new distribution strategies, including IB's content alliance with CNN.com. the data comes from approximately 70 TV station Web sites.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 4:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 17, 2007

IAB Touts Audit Progress, Unveils Research Advisory Board

Since ClickZ last reported on their audit status, not much has transpired with comScore and Nielsen/NetRatings. Today, the Interactive Advertising Bureau sent out a re-cap of what's gone down since April, when the organization sternly suggested the two audience measurement firms have their methodologies analyzed by the Media Ratings Council in the hopes of being accredited.

According to the IAB, comScore has completed its pre-audit, but hasn't set out a timeline for the full audit. Nielsen/NetRatings is going through its full audit now.

Since the IAB really got this audit ball rolling in the first place, a progress report makes sense right about now, especially when other groups like the Advertising Research Foundation are making noise about ensuring the quality and validity of research conducted online. While the groups have different agendas, it's clear the interactive industry zeitgeist is focused on research and measurement quality and transparency.

The IAB also announced today the formation of a Research Advisory Board, an addition to its already-functioning Research Council. The new group will "define the cross-industry efforts necessary to educate the industry about critical issues in audience measurement," according to a press release.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 5:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

September 14, 2007

Old Dudes Dig Fred

On top of what we've been providing on a regular basis, we've got some more interesting tidbits on traffic to presidential candidate sites from Hitwise. For one -- not that this would come as much of a surprise -- older men are gravitating towards Fred Thompson’s official campaign site. During the four weeks ending September 8, over 65 percent of Thompson site visitors were male, and around 40 percent were 55 or older. Almost 11 percent of his site visitors were from Tennessee, where he once served as a U.S. Senator.

Also of interest: Libertarian-style Republican candidate Ron Paul's site grabbed the most traffic from social sites like Facebook, Flickr, MySpace and YouTube. Official sites from Dems Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were next in line when it came to traffic arriving from such sites.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 3:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

August 22, 2007

Epsilon Rebrands Data Services as Abacus

Following last year's acquisition of Abacus, a data firm previously owned by DoubleClick, Epsilon has rebranded all its data services to reflect the integrated brand. The shift toward using the Abacus name was undertaken "after bringing Abacus into our family earlier this year, we immediately recognized the tremendous brand equity we had across our two well-established brands," said Michael Iccarino, president and CEO of Epsilon, in a company statement.

The data services from Epsilon will rebrand as follows.

• Epsilon's Advantage Choice is now Abacus Consumer.
  
• Epsilon's New Mover is now Abacus New Mover.
  
• Epsilon's Target Source is now Abacus Survey.
  
• Abacus Consumer Alliance is now Abacus Consumer Cooperative.
  
• Abacus Business to Business Alliance is now Abacus Business to Business Cooperative.

  Epsilon also launched Abacus Business, which includes data on 22 million businesses. Data operations under the existing Abacus cooperative including Abacus [ONE], Abacus FastPath, Abacus Market Insight, Abacus BuyerPoint, and Abacus ChannelView continue unchanged from previous offerings.
  

  Posted by Enid Burns at 5:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

  August 8, 2007

  Why is NetRatings Not on ARF's Research Quality Committee?

  Post by Kate Kaye:

  Today we reported on the Ad Research Foundation's new initiative to develop guidelines for panel-based research online. I asked Nielsen//NetRatings, an ARF member, why the company doesn't have a representative on the steering committee for the Online Research Quality Council.

  Nielsen came back with a statement from its VP of Product Marketing and Measurement Science Mainak Mazumdar:

  "Nielsen is an active member of the ARF and NetRatings participates in a number of its initiatives. In the case of this initiative, the council appears -- at least based on its members -- to be looking at online access panels as opposed to the metered media and market research panels that we focus on at NetRatings. We continue to be involved with the various industry bodies, including the ARF, IAB and MRC -- and are actively involved in the accreditation process with the MRC."

  Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 1:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

  August 3, 2007

  Web Site Maintenance

  There's a few tools at your disposal to make sure your site runs smoothly, and that your site provides the best brand experience. After releasing RIAx to measure rich media applications in May, Avenue A / Razorfish this week released Super-intelligent Link Crawler (SiLC). The tool crawls Web sites to find broken links and 404 error messages. It also analyzes why errors occur, and looks into how your Web site is seen by search engines, and how to improve those results. Avenue A / Razorfish used SiLC in conjunction with SEO and Web design teams to evaluate U.S. News & World Report's site. The tool determined the site's articles weren't being ranked because the Web and print versions registered as duplicates. The two months after the evaluation and relaunch, the site saw 24 percent increase in organic visits, and 45 percent increase in organic visits from Google compared to the previous year.

  Accenture's Marketing Sciences division has a new Web site benchmarking system called Accenture Web Evaluator. The tool analyzes how ell company's Web sites attract and retain customers, support and reinforce their brand, deliver services, and generate sales. Accenture evaluated over 260 Web sites using nine key factors comprised of 33 criteria based on delivering high-performing, branded customer experiences on the Web. The top sites include Nike, Ford, Google, Adidas, and Microsoft. Those nine factors: search and navigation; information; service; engagement; relationship building; branding; e-commerce; globalization; and number of visitors.

  Both tools provide insights, and possibly overlap with existing Web analytics solutions you may already have in place to measure your site. Many of those Web analytics products area also getting updates as the demand for better metrics and site optimization escalates.

  Posted by Enid Burns at 1:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

  July 16, 2007

  Trade Group Forms to Tackle Standards in Downloadable Media

  Does podcast media require its own industry association, separate from the IAB, AAAA and other existing options? A group of companies including Apple, NPR, Nielsen Online, Kiptronic and PodTech appears to think so.

  Those firms are among the 14 that have banded together to try and standardize advertising and audience measurement for downloadable files. The group is calling itself the Association for Downloadable Media, and will focus mainly on podcasts and other downloadable content delivered via RSS, peer-to-peer, mobile, site downloads and "other platforms to come."

  ADM said it plans to cooperate rather than compete with fellow trade organizations like those listed above. In addition to its principle charter to develop standards, it will also engage in industry outreach and education. Support and membership will be extended not only publishers and producers of downloadable content, but also advertisers, agencies, research firms, and hardware and software makers involved with the medium.

  The group, which didn't return a phone call seeking more information, so far consists only of an initial advisory board. It said five committees would quickly be formed to address specific mandates.
  

  Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 4:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

  June 28, 2007

  Google Top Referral Site for Clinton, Paul in May

  Presidential contenders, Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Ron Paul came out on top among major party presidential candidates when it came to traffic to their official campaign sites in May, according to Hitwise. The site measurement firm just sent me some supplemental data showing the top five referral sites driving that traffic for each.

  Both candidates' sites have four referral sites in common, Google, MySpace, Yahoo Search, Yahoo Mail. Yep, Google comes out on top, driving nearly 20 percent of traffic to those sites. Check out the rest here, part of ClickZ's ongoing election data coverage.

  If you haven't caught our other recent election-related data coverage, here are a few more links:

  Giuliani Site Visitors Seek Health Content, Clinton's Go for Games and Country Music

  Candidates Using E-mail for More Than Fundraising in May, June

  Clinton on CNN Only, McCain on Conservative Sites and Networks in April

  Posted by Kate Kaye at 4:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

  June 27, 2007

  Can Mobile Measure OOH Media Exposure?

  Can mobile devices enable the measurement of out-of-home media exposure and conversion?

  That's what research firm IMMI is betting on. Today at the ARF's Audience Measurement 2.0 conference, the company's co-founder Amanda Welsh, walked us through a new product that will debut this fall.

  Here's how it works: An audience panel's mobile phones are pinged for a 10 second duration every 30 seconds (these durations can be varied). The ambient sounds of whatever setting they're in are monitored. If OOH advertising audio is detected (radio, TV or closed network systems), these sounds are matched to the corresponding ads. Additionally, a small device called a beacon is plugged in next to the TV the panelist uses most often to monitor their viewing habits. IMMI can track not only ad exposure, but also take a stab at coming up with conversion figures. In tests, the company claims panelists exposed to ads for the movie "300" converted at a rate of 9 percent, for example, while non-exposed conversion was c. 2 percent.

  The pings pick up other data as well, such as the phone's battery level, and even whether or not it