More than half of marketers who responded to a survey on the impact of attribution said understanding the path to conversion allows them to more accurately disburse budgets. Many, however, still don't understand how the process should work. Marketers have been working to understand how a variety of channels influence sales. In time, the promise of attribution will integrate offline activities, too, but for now this study -- "Marketing Attribution, Valuing the Customer Journey," released Tuesday from Google Analytics and Econsultancy -- looks to optimizing budgets and campaigns for more traditional models and stages. For those who do understand the process, 52% of client-side marketers report that attribution has led to an increase in spending on some digital channels, and 72% of marketers say that attribution leads to better return on investments. Once a linear path, the road to conversion becomes complicated as mobile, social, search, television, radio, billboards, automatic identification technologies and other channels join the process. Not understating attribution remains the biggest challenge in adopting the practice, according to Bill Kee, product manager at Google. Understanding how channels influence sales through attribution also means a cultural shift at most organizations. Marketers that still rely on the last-click attribution model continue to put most of the company's marketing budgets in channels closest to conversions, such as purchases. Some 51% of survey respondents named the lack of priority in marketing as the No. 1 barrier to attribution, followed by being unsure how to choose the appropriate model and a need to better understand the potential advantages tied for No. 2 at 42%. Other barriers include a lack of data or access to data to inform the process, 41%; new staff and resources, 37%; lack of budget, 33%; lack of management buy-in, 32%; and attribution technology not yet mature enough, 27%.
Despite its strong video presence, YouTube continues to trail rivals in key areas -- advertising, for one, as Hulu attracted more than 1.5 billion video ad impressions in February compared to YouTube’s roughly 1 billion, according to comScore. New research shows that several video properties -- led by CollegeHumor.com, Break.com, and ComedyCentral.com -- led YouTube in “return rates.” In 2011, more than 60% of users who viewed a video on CollegeHumor.com returned for more, according to a new report from Read It Later, a popular service that allows users to bookmark Web pages and specific content from their personal computer, tablet or smartphone. Among Read It Later’s roughly 4 million users, Break.com scored a return rate of exactly 60%, followed by ComedyCentral.com, Hulu, and Vevo -- all of which achieved return rates of over 50%. Along with Netflix and Veoh, by contrast, YouTube scored a return rate of about 43%. “YouTube's return rates are actually about normal, and what we expected,” explained Mark Armstrong, editorial director at Read it Later. “More significant is the high loyalty with video from sites like CollegeHumor, Break.com and Comedy Central. These are sites that specialize in specific brands of comedy and original programming that resonate with their core audience.” YouTube representatives did not respond to a request for comment by press time. Across the board, the number of videos that Read It Later users are saving is up by more than 120% over the past year, while YouTube ranks as the most-saved domain. However, it currently offers optimized viewing for YouTube and Vimeo, which it admits is likely to affect their respective prominence among other properties. Specifically, Read It Later users can watch full-screen clips inside the app via a video player for both YouTube and Vimeo. Other video sites are shown in the “Web view.” The company is also seeing new evidence that its app is helping people consume longer video than what has been traditionally embraced online. In an analysis of its Top 1,000 saved videos, the median length was nearly 30 minutes. “What this shows is that with the right tools, users are embracing both short-form and long-form video content,” Armstrong said. When Armstrong looked at the 1,000 most popular videos from July through December, he found that 32% of the Top 1000 videos were over five minutes long. With 68% of videos saved under five minutes, short-form still rules. Ads and return rates aside, Google’s video properties -- helmed by YouTube -- still led the way with 147.4 million unique viewers in February, according to comScore. Yahoo Sites came in second with 60.9 million, followed by Vevo with 52 million, Facebook.com with 43.6 million, and Viacom Digital (which includes ComedyCentral.com) with 43.2 million. In February, nearly 38 billion video views occurred, with Google Sites generating the highest number at 16.7 billion, followed by Hulu with 951 million and Yahoo Sites with 721 million.
Online radio is the fastest-growing music-listening category among U.S. consumers, according to new findings from NPD Group. The market research firm found that 43% of U.S. Web users in 2011 chose to listen to music via Pandora, Slacker, Yahoo Music and other online radio services -- up nine percentage points from 2010. At the same time, music-listening on AM/FM radio and CDs remained relatively steady, at 84% and 74%, respectively. NPD’s annual music study found the number of online radio listeners grew by 18 million last year. The format is most popular among people in the 18-25 age bracket. But strong growth was also seen among people ages 36 to 50, which suggests that young listeners may be turning their parents onto digital radio. While demand for free online radio is increasing, the appetite for paid options remains low. Some 42% of Web users listened to free radio in 2011 compared to just 3% who paid for online radio. Sites like Pandora have benefited directly from the growing audience for online radio. Despite lower-than-expected revenue in its fiscal fourth quarter, the company still saw ad sales climb 74% to $72.1 million from a year ago. Privately held Spotify likewise made a successful entrance into the U.S. market last year. The U.K-based company, however, recently extended a promotion that allows U.S. users to continue to stream music for free, underscoring the challenge of converting people to paying subscribers. Outside the U.S., it also lifted a restriction imposing a five-song limit on free users. The NPD research indicated Facebook doesn’t play an influential role when it comes to online music. Only 12% of Web users listened to music integrated into Facebook or other social networks by services including Spotify and MOG. Spotify, for instance, has only about a dozen apps on its platform to date. “There’s no doubt that Facebook has helped drive music listening and discovery,” said Russ Crupnick, senior vice president of industry analysis at NPD. “But what is not yet clear is the platform’s importance, in terms of ongoing music usage and purchasing.” Facebook has long been rumored to start its own music service, but so far has relied on outside partners to supply music offerings through the site. The NPD study results were based on online surveys of 5,799 U.S. consumers age 13 and up, between December 14, 2011 and January 3, 2012.
TRUSTe is unveiling a new tool that mobile companies will use to target iPhone and Android users, while also enabling consumers to opt out of receiving in-app ads targeted based on their activity. To accomplish this, TRUSTe is offering app developers access to a software development kit that will place an identifier -- which it calls a Trusted Preference Identifier -- on users' devices. App developers also will employ that identifier to recognize and target users. If people opt out of receiving targeted ads, that information will be tied to their identifier. Mobile companies will be able to access TRUSTe's database of Trusted Preference Identifiers and determine whether users have opted out; if so, the mobile companies won't serve targeted ads to those users. Companies that have already indicated they will use the tool, called TRUSTed Mobile, include Electronic Arts, HasOffers, Human Demand, InMobi, JiWire, Medialets, Millennial Media and Nexage. In the past, mobile companies were able to track iPhone users through their devices' 40-character identifiers known as UDIDs (unique device identifiers). Some mobile ad networks allowed people to opt out, but the process required them to write down their 40-character UDID and submit it to the network. Apple recently began limiting developers' access to UDIDs, which has left mobile companies seeking alternatives. A few of the options to emerge -- such as tracking iPhone users based on their MAC addresses or their phones digital fingerprints -- are seen as privacy unfriendly, largely because people have no easy way of deleting a MAC address or digital fingerprint. TRUSTe CEO Chris Babel says that consumers who install the identifier can later effectively delete the data associated with their devices by "renewing" or "revoking" it. Consumers who "renew" the identifier will receive a new one that maintains their opt-out preferences, but isn't tied to their old identifier -- and, therefore, can't be linked to cookie-like data previously associated with their devices. People who "revoke" the identifier will simply receive a new one that doesn't include information about their opt-out preferences -- similar to what happens when consumers delete all desktop cookies, including opt-out cookies. Jules Polonetsky, co-chair and director of the think tank Future of Privacy Forum, praised the tool for giving consumers an easier way to opt out of in-app ad targeting than submitting UDIDs to ad networks. "By providing a clickable mobile opt-out, TRUSTed Mobile ads makes consumer choice much easier," he says.
ACTV8.me, which powers second-screen interactivity synced with TV content, will launch apps linked with Fox shows such as “New Girl.” Fox has also taken an undisclosed stake in the company. ACTV8.me also has an undetermined relationship with a Mark Burnett production entity and has been running an app linked with NBC show “The Celebrity Apprentice.” The free Fox apps, which allow viewers to chat and answer trivia questions in real-time as a show airs, can be used on iPhones. In coming weeks, it will be usable on iPads and Android devices. ACTV8.me CEO Brian Shuster stated that the focus was to nurture new, compelling interactive and social features "that enhance the overall television entertainment experience and ultimately grow audience viewership." ACTV8.me is one of several entities, including Nielsen, trying to provide networks with systems allowing viewers to watch a show and interact with additional content (and other viewers) live on a second device. Networks can build engagement, as well as derive some ad revenue. An app for TBS’s “Conan” is sponsored by AT&T. “The Celebrity Apprentice” app offers contests, including one to win a Buick Verano. Buick is one of the advertisers that ACTV8.me said would sponsor its platform for the show this season. Others include Crystal Light and Walgreens. CEO Shuster added that there was an “overall goal of gamifying the second-screen experience."
The leading smartphone device maker, Samsung, has tossed its hat into the mobile ad ring with the announcement this week it would launch an ad exchange later this year. Samsung says it will work with OpenX to create a private ad exchange using real-time bidding (RTB) on mobile inventory. The Samsung AdHub Market, Powered by OpenX claims to be the first such private ad exchange aimed at global mobile inventory across both smartphones and tablets. Samsung is the largest maker of Android-powered smartphones, and it maintains a line of Android-powered tablets as well. Slated for a second half launch, AdHub will allow purchasing of inventory both from app developers as well as from Samsung directly. The RTB model is meant to appeal to developers, who can set minimum pricing on their inventory and let advertisers bid for each impression served on the devices in real-time. Samsung says that the market will allow developers to control their inventory and approve all sources of ads. The AdHub puts Samsung in direct competition with one of its chief partners, Google. Google not only makes the Android operating system that powers the most popular Samsung models, but it also runs the AdMob ad network that already serves inventory in Android app. The announcement indicates Samsung’s increased determination to take on Apple on multiple fronts. Apple already has the iAds ad network running within its iOS operating system. And while Apple continues to eye the TV market, Samsung has already launched a TV app ad marketplace, also called AdHub. Samsung is partnering with an established player in the Web ad technology arena. OpenX is extending into mobile with an ad serving platform that supports standard mobile ad formats as well as the newer MRAID rich media standards.
A majority of smartphone subscribers in the U.S. now use the Google Android operating system, according to the latest tracking reports from comScore. For the three months ending in February, comScore sees Android with 50.1% of the market, up 3.2 points since November. Apple’s iOS also increased its share of the market -- albeit less slowly than Android -- reaching 30.2%, up 1.5 points or less than half the growth rate of its major rival. And the numbers add up to a two-company race at this point, since Android and Apple now control more than 80% of the market. Other challengers are seeing their share of the market continue to diminish. The troubled Reasearch in Motion BlackBerry platform is off another 3.2 points in the period, now holding 13.4% of the smartphone market. And Microsoft continues its struggle to make Windows Phone a realistic contender. Microsoft has only 3.9% of the smartphone market here, off another 1.3 points. All categories of mobile content use continue to escalate, according to comScore’s sample of over 30,000 mobile users. Text messaging is approaching ubiquity, with 74.8% of all mobile users texting (+2.2 points). Digital content access is up across the board, with using an app and browsing the Web now done by almost half of mobile customers (49.5% and 49.2%, respectively). Digital content access by phone is on an especially striking trajectory, with increases in app use up 4.6 points and browser use up 4.8 points in a single quarter. Not all other categories of mobile data are also on the rise. Social networks now are used by 36.1% of mobile customers (+3.1 points), and 32.3% played a mobile game (+2.6 points). Finally, almost a quarter of users are playing music on their phones. Apple’s strong holiday sales of iPhones helped the company increase its share of the OEM market in hardware to 13.5% (+2.3 points) Samsung continues to lead the hardware market, however, with 25.6% share, followed by LG with 19.4%.
If content is king, then context is the power that lies behind the throne. Conventionally, when we speak of context in media terms, we are typically -- and understandably -- referring to the programming environment in which an ad appears -- the media context, if you will. Turner has illustrated the importance of this through its InContext ad sales initiative. It has had some rigorous research applied to it that illustrates that some pretty powerful uplifts in key metrics can occur when ads are placed within the right media context. But while this is undoubtedly a critical part of the contextual mix, given the audience delivered and the tonality of the programming that sets a mood, it’s not the whole picture. As media has become so much more multifaceted, there are situational factors to bear in mind, which were less important in the days before interactivity, mobility and the fragmentation of media platforms. Now context is about more than the medium. Marshall McLuhan wasn’t wrong when he declared the medium to be the message -- but he was only 20% right as far as today’s communications landscape is concerned. Why 20%? Because in these modern media times, when a consumer-centric perspective is no longer a luxury or a throwaway remark in a conference speech but a critical part of a brands communications DNA, there are five dominant dimensions to context that need to be understood and planned for:
There’s a unique form of mobile targeting going on in China. Last week I had the opportunity to share some mobile insights with the general managers, directors and heads of many luxury brands in China, such as Chanel, Land Rover, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Estee Lauder, Swatch Group, Bvlgari and Hermes. As in other markets, the brand leaders were looking for what they should be doing in mobile and were highly interested in any mobile innovation occurring in the West. Their main focus is on viable mobile business models, ranging from advertising to commerce and anything in between. Most in the audience said they have a mobile strategy, many for more than a year. Individually, almost half of them said they carried two mobile phones, which I also regularly find common in executive audiences in the U.S. and other countries. As background, the mobile market in China is somewhat different from the U.S. The leading phones sold in China are from Nokia and Samsung, while the U.S. market is led by HTC and Apple, according to Strategy Analytics. Perhaps the biggest personal usage difference is the actual cost of the phones. For example, unlike the U.S. -- where carriers subsidize the cost of phones -- people in China pay the entire cost themselves. I visited the major Shanghai Apple store, which was jammed with people on each of the two floors, to check pricing. An iPhone 4S, depending on memory, costs either $790 or $932 in U.S. dollars. And people were lined up to buy them. Lots of people. This also partly explains why everyone has a passcode lock on the opening screens of their phones, since they are reportedly frequent targets of theft because of the value. The other dynamic is that the I-must-have-an-iPhone phenomenon among certain demographics in China provides a self-defined market. As one example of a business taking advantage of Apple obsession, the two-year-old mobile lifestyle publication iWeekly is made available as an app for only iPhones and iPads. So while Android leads the operating system market and Nokia and Samsung lead in hardware sales, iWeekly sticks with just Apple. The choice seems to have worked, since the app has been downloaded 5 million times and is the number one lifestyle category app in China, according to Jane Yu, vice president and general manager of iWeekly, who notes that it is on 20 percent of all iPhones in China. Other executives in the company told me that marketers easily understand the demographic of all iPhone and iPad owners, since the devices are so expensive. The reasoning goes that since the devices are bought by the most affluent, they must be the prime target for luxury brands. It will be interesting to watch as more smartphones enter the China market, whether targeting only Apple wireless devices continues to be a winning formula. Last quarter there were more than 24 million smartphones shipped in China -- more than in the U.S., according to Strategy Analytics. Another observation is that in some ways, the mobile market in China resembles that of Latin America -- where there are 630 million mobile connections -- while China has a billion. But in both markets, two geographies dominate the market, Brazil and Colombia in Latin America and Beijing and Shanghai in China. The remaining areas in both countries have less of an affluent target mobile population. This begs the question of how to target within the markets, whether by Apple products only or some other means. As a personal observation, I found that some things mobile work in China and others don’t. A rather annoying finding came after Verizon assured me (twice) that my Samsung Galaxy Nexus would be fully functional in China. They then easily sold me the global roaming package, data, texting and all that. While the phone worked for voice, none of the data features ever worked except over Wi-Fi, which could easily be found. A bit more difficult to find were the passwords protecting all the Wi-Fi locations. The good news was that my iPhone 4S on AT&T worked flawlessly everywhere, including location-based services. Twitter and Facebook? Blocked in Shanghai. Every once in a great while, a random Tweet seemed to get through, but otherwise no outside social networks worked, other than those locally originated, such as Sina Weibo, the microblogging site the government throttled back for a few days last week. My trusty Speed-o-Meter app, which I sometimes use to clock the Amtrak Acela at up to 150 MPH, didn’t work on the famous Maglev high-speed train that reaches the airport in minutes at speeds of up to 260 MPH. No GPS could be located, although the app later worked in a car on the way to the same airport. Price comparison by barcode scanning was a big disappointment, since none of the codes at any of the major stores visited, such as the Gap, could be identified by any of my usually reliable code readers, such as ShopSavvy. As in other markets, the other observation is that everyone is always using their mobile phone, for talking and texting. But virtually no one looks at their phone while crossing the streets. As I was repeatedly reminded in Shanghai, there are no rules for driving and vehicles have the right of way -- and they take advantage of it. I can vouch for that.
A shift by consumers to use multiple devices to research and make purchases continues to add complexity for advertisers and retailers who thought they understood the path to conversion for their product lines. The shopping behavior continues to become disparate, according to an online study commissioned by Local and conducted by the e-tailing group. It explores consumer preferences and their research and purchase plans on mobile devices. The study analyzed responses from more than 1,000 consumers. Initial findings reveal that two paths to purchase are rarely identical. Consumers seem to take a personal path to purchase using multiple devices, from PCs to smartphones to tablets. While PCs play an important role in the shopping process, a physical store is still important for 90% of shoppers, and 60% of respondents reported they have researched products and services several times monthly using a mobile device. Sherry Thomas-Zon, vice president of Local, said cross-channel research and buying present opportunities for advertisers. "With all the interaction points that cross devices, you no longer have a clear sense of where the consumer is in the purchase funnel," she said. "You don't know the exact information they access on the devices, though we can make an inference." Nearly two of three shoppers use at least one device to research and purchase while shopping, and 28% use two devices at a time. More than one in three shoppers made at least one purchase with their mobile devices during the past six months, and tablet shoppers have an even higher propensity to make a purchase on the device, with one in four having purchased six times or more in the past six months. While most consumers embrace mobile devices, they primarily use the devices as research tools, not for completing the transaction. Some 47% of consumers confirm they use their smartphone to search for local information, such as information about a local store they want to visit. Prior to the visit, they use smartphones to conduct further research, including comparing prices, checking for sales, previewing products and reading reviews. Forty-six percent of consumers look up prices on a store's mobile site, and 42% check inventory prior to shopping in the store. Some 36% of consumers said they bought more on a laptop or a desktop this year compared with last, followed by 20% on a mobile device, such as tablet and smartphone, and 14% in stores.