This June, Google and Nielsen conducted opening weekend exit polls of more than 2,000 U.S. moviegoers to gauge how online information affected their box-office behavior.

According to the report, TV and the Web hold almost the same amount of sway over potential moviegoers--as 68% of respondents said that TV was influential in their decision to see the film, while 66% said the same about the Internet. In comparison, print (both magazines and newspapers) and radio were markedly less effective, coming in at 44% and 41% respectively, according to Google.

When it came to search, a third of all respondents said they had done a Web search about the movie they'd just seen, and 62% said that search was influential in their decision to see the movie.

Online trailers were also highly influential, as 24% of moviegoers polled said they had watched the trailer for the movie they'd just seen online--and 91% of these said that it was "very or somewhat" influential in their decision to see it.

Google also asked advertising-specific questions--breaking a group of respondents down into moviegoers who had seen Web content only (including search, reviews, video, blogs and social networking about the film) and moviegoers who could recall seeing both Web content and display ads specifically.

Moviegoers who had seen ads and content were 68% more likely to search for more information on the film, 130% more likely to visit the official movie Web site, and 23% more likely to talk to others about the movie than their info-only counterparts. Meanwhile, respondents who'd seen both ads and Web info pertaining to the movie were 40% more likely to recommend it to their family or friends.

The report also found that the number of moviegoers who said the Web was their first source of information about the movie they had just seen increased from 8% in 2006, to 13% in 2007--a 63% increase year-over-year.

This news story is important. I recommend that everyone read it.