Moving along the digital road

Feature

03 October 2011

Media owners welcome the greater integration of digital information into the EMS survey, which confirms BBC Worldwide’s position as the most popular online platform. Yet others point out that the multi-platform analysis can still develop further, writes Josh Colley.

In an age where technology has begun to rule consumers’ lives, the pull of digital content is difficult to deny. But even though smartphones and tablet devices have changed the way users consume content, the world of research has failed to keep pace.

This year marks another step in the integration of digital information into the EMS survey with Synovate adding digital information from the well-established Digital Life research into the main survey.

A third of EMS respondents access social networks through their mobile, above the 22% who play games and 18% who use electronic banking, and not far behind the third most popular activity, accessing email (40%). Internet access (55%) and SMS texting (68%) ranks as the most popular mobile activities.

A NATURAL STEP
Time and Fortune EMEA publisher Andy Bush is one of several EMS subscribers who believes that the integration of digital data into the main survey was due. He says: “This has been talked about from an audience research point of view for a long time, but these things take a little longer to establish themselves. It’s a necessary step, but it’s still very exciting.”

Joe Hall, BBC World News and BBC.com’s senior manager of business insight, says: “Every year we’re told this will be the year of mobile, and I’m really pleased that Synovate has finally given the data so that people can actually plan mobile pan-European campaigns.”

Others share the BBC’s excitement over the new changes. “In the past 12 months we’ve invested an awful lot of money in digital content to enhance the viewer experience,” says CNBC’s EMEA research director Mike Jeanes. “The whole integrated communications package is becoming more important for media owners.”

While the integration of more and more digital information into the main EMS survey seems a natural step for many media owners, for some the survey still has some way to go before it accounts fully for digital. Euronews managing director for sales Olivier De Montchenu says: “In terms of digital presence, we look to be advanced across digital platforms, such as Sony, Philips and Panasonic on-demand devices, but this is yet to really be accounted for in the online figures.”

BBC Worldwide’s portfolio of websites maintains its stranglehold as the mostpopular online platform with a daily reach of 6.6%, which amounts to 3.1 million users. Sky News is the next best performer, at just under 1.2 million users, with CNN websites not far behind at 984,000. National Geographic and Eurosport complete the five most visited media owner brands.

Didier Mormesse, CNN’s senior vice-president of advertising sales research and development/audience insight, is a firm believer in the power of cross-platform reach.

“We can see that the web offerings are becoming stronger for consumers and it’s an area that we are looking to be stronger in,” he explains. “It’s important to our brand that we are there as the shift continues to take place to more digital and mobile platforms.”