MRI Bolsters Mag Data, Appeases Media Planners

magazine rackMediamark Research and Intelligence has doubled the number of people in the online surveys for its issue-specific magazine readership study, from 2,500 to 5,000 per week. The service, launched in June 2007, allows marketers to determine the total reach of specific campaigns, as well as their success in reaching targeted demographics.

The research provides more detailed and frequent data than is provided by its overall survey of consumer magazines, released twice a year in the spring and fall. In total, MRI will survey 260,000 American adults every year for the study, which determines how quickly magazine audiences accumulate for individual issues of about 195 magazines.

The move is probably intended to placate clients that criticized MRI for skimping on the survey size. Media planners, in particular, had complained that the survey base for the issue-specific readership study wasn't large enough to provide the kind of detailed data demanded by advertising clients.

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While MRI is the dominant player in magazine audience research, last year, the Magazine Publishers of America invited proposals for a new magazine audience measurement service that was widely seen as a competitor to MRI's issue-specific study--in essence holding MRI's feet to the fire to force it to address the perceived shortcomings of its own service.

Since then, MRI has moved to bolster the scope and detail of data provided by the issue-specific study. In July, the company acquired Starch Communications, a sister company also owned by the GfK Group, with an eye toward providing detailed, issue-specific measurement of individual print ads.

Previously, as separate companies, MRI focused on measuring and describing audiences with demographic data, while Starch focused on determining the reception and impact of ads. Also in July, MRI began incorporating age, education and income data into the issue-specific study.

Kathi Love, president and CEO of MRI, remarked on the latest move: "By increasing the sample size of the Issue Specific Readership Study, advertisers receive more robust data on the audiences of magazine issues carrying their ad campaigns. These are the sort of granular metrics print advertisers increasingly need and demand."

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