How Ad Position Affects Conversion Rates

Thanks Online Media Daily for this post on banner location.

For marketers wondering how conversion rates change depending on where ads appear on Web pages, Google Chief Economist Hal Varian appears to have an answer.

Varian calls the problem "tricky," because Google ranks ads by bid times and ad quality, so ads in higher positions tend to have higher quality. These higher-quality ads tend to have higher conversion rates. He writes in a post on the AdWords blog that this means marketers may see a correlation between auction position and conversion rates.

Another fact that influences conversions: marketers increasing bids might see their average position move lower on the page. That's because when bids increase, ads appear in new auctions, and tend to work their way up from the bottom. This can push down the campaign's overall position, he writes.

"We have used a statistical model to account for these effects and found that -- on average, there is very little variation in conversion rates by position for the same ad," Varian writes. "For example, for pages where 11 ads are shown the conversion rate varies by less than 5% across positions."

An ad that had a 1.0% conversion rate in the best position would have about a 0.95% conversion rate in the worst position, on average, Varian writes. He explains that ads above search results convert within ±2% of right-hand side positions.

Didit VP Mark Simon says the New York company sees similar conversion rates occurring with its clients. "Not all traffic is converting traffic," he says. "The trick is to offer the creative and post-click experience that draws in the right searchers and drives them to convert, while also targeting the right market segment to convert on a given term."

Twitter powered car recommendations

Thanks Gerry.

Whether i'd buy one based on my tweets is another story, but nice idea:
http://caseyshultz.com/vw-ad.php

Answers to Questions from Twitter on Teen Practices

Thanks Futurelab for this Q&A on teen Twitter usage and attitudes

by: danah boyd

Before I headed to Atlanta to do fieldwork, I asked folks who follow me on Twitter (@zephoria) what questions I should ask teens. Many of the questions that I received were more general questions about teens, rather than questions for teens. Still, I'm going to take a stab at very briefly answering some of the questions that I received based on what I know and what I learned. I am not answering the larger questions that would require pages and pages and my apologies if my short answers are not sufficient but I wanted to at least respond. Thank you all who contributed questions and my apologies if I didn't answer yours.

To all who asked questions about Twitter: average teens don't use Twitter. They may in the future, but they do not now. Those who do are early adopters and not representative of any mainstream teen practice. Because of Oprah and celebs, some teens are starting to hear about it, but they don't understand it and they aren't using it.

@connyb: Parents' concerned with what kids do online, right? I'd ask teens if they know what exactly their parents do at their dayjobs.

Teens do not tend to know exactly what their parents do, nor do they particularly care. (It's important to note that parental concern stems from a position of power, not interest in the actual activities.)

@mauraweb: when they're searching for info, how do they know what info to trust? esp. w/internet searches

Media literacy amongst teens is extremely varied, but the short answer is that most don't know what to trust. They know that they are not supposed to trust Wikipedia because it's editable (and they automatically recall Wikipedia when you ask about trustworthy information.. that's so actively hammered down their throat, it's painful). One girl told me that she trusts websites that "look" like they are reputable. When I asked her about this, she told me that she could "just tell" when something was a good source. And besides, it came from Google. Le sigh.

@AlterSeekers: According to Facebook Era, Teens see email as a "work" tool and prefer to Facebook message. Is this true among these teens?

I was surprised to find that email is deader than ever among teens. As more of their parents and teachers are getting on Facebook (or MySpace), they see little reason to email with anyone. Thus, email is increasingly needed for having an account on various sites and for getting access to or sending attachments. But even when teens do use email for "work", they do not use it for social purposes.

@mirroredpool: What borders to teens place of social networking sites and education? How would they react to using an SNS to do class work?

@annejonas: i'm curious if they want schools involved in social networks or if they like it as a social space outside the realm of formal edu.

This is messy. Many teens have ZERO interest in interacting with teachers on social network sites, but there are also quite a few who are interested in interacting with SOME teachers there. Still, this is primarily a social space and their interactions with teachers are primarily to get more general advice and help. In some ways, its biggest asset in the classroom is the way in which its not a classroom tool and not loaded this way. Given that teens don't Friend all of their classmates, there are major issues in terms of using this for groupwork because of boundary issues.

@shcdean: What future do they see for FB or Twitter.

They don't use Twitter. When asked, teens always say that they'll use their preferred social network site (or social media service) FOREVER as a sign of their passion for it now. If they expect that they'll "grow out of it", it's a sign that the service is waning among that group at this very moment. So they're not a good predictor of their own future usage.

@lazygal: Do they really care about/use school library websites? Twitter? Pageflakes? Libguides? or only if teacher insists?

Nope, they don't. All but Twitter are categorized as school tools and are only used when absolutely necessary and Google won't suffice.

@anindita: My favorite question: read anything good lately?

I asked "Recent book that you enjoyed" on my questionnaire. Half said "none" and most said books they read in school (with a *). Books that were mentioned: City of Bones, Ashes & Glass, A Year of Impossible Goodbyes, The Outsiders*, Drama High Series, Mice and Men*, Catcher in the Rye*, The Poisonwood Bible*, Twilight series (twice).

@texas_sooner: I'd be interested to know if teens denied access to SNS (by parents/choice/SES reasons etc ) feel left out/pressure to join, etc.

Parental restrictions are a huge source of frustration because of a sense of isolation. (As a result, they are typically ignored.) SES is not actually a predictor of non-use at this point except in more rural regions where Internet access is generally absent for the majority of teens. In these cases, teens don't feel left out because they aren't being socially isolated by it.

@SavvyPriya: what is one thing that teens are passionate about?

This varies across teens, but God comes up a lot. The only thing that really competes is friends. Family is also important to some teens. School and sports are also important to some teens. And then some teens have particular hobbies or activities that they love. But God and friends really dominate the passion list.

@paullowe: where do they get their news from and what kind of news do they want to get

Teens primarily get their news from word-of-mouth, not directly from any particular source. School current events and TV time are the other dominant place I hear about. Otherwise, it's generally osmosis. They walk through the living room when their parents are watching the news. Or they pass by a news article when they get online. But they are not directly and intentionally consuming much news at all.

@thornet: ask 'em how they judge whether a news outlet is credible.teens r good @ spotting fakes & phonies;wonder what their news criteria r

They don't watch a lot of news and they have no media literacy training and they're not even thinking about credibility of news.

@andrewmiller: how does having a smartphone change their interactions w/each other on SNS? more photos/videos? faster rumors? have/have-not gap?

A gap is definitely occurring. A smart phone means more more more more more - more SMS, more web consumption, more status updates, more photos, etc. Certain smart phones are desperately desired items. That said, teens are also doing quite well with the iPod Touch + wifi as an alternative. Smart phones are helping them stay more engaged and connected.

@shawncalhoun: Were teens more engaged in politics by Obamas #socialmedia storm? If so has engagmnt continued evolved in2 something new or faded?

Most teens are pretty oblivious to his social media practices. That's actually hitting the college/20-somethings more.

@alexleavitt: Ask them if they feel like they'll want to develop the social Net when they get older: eg., developers developers developers.

No. Most don't associate using social media with computer science or developing software whatsoever. And the classes on programming in their schools aren't helping.

@pbernard: do they still care about changing the ringtone on their phone, even though they make less and less calls?

Ringtones are tricky with American youth because it very much depends on who pays for the phone/ringtones. Among teens who can change their ringtones whenever they want, there's still motivation. The phone still rings (and beeps with new SMSes) and having a cool sound is desired. But of course many teens spend most of their day with their phones on buzz-only.

@harraton: Do they care about their privacy?

VERY much so. But what constitutes privacy for them is often quite different than what constitutes privacy for adults. Privacy is not dead.

@simonchambers: I'd ask how they see themselves helping to solve problems like climate change and extreme poverty...

They don't. Most teens are not that engaged with larger societal issues (except as activities to get into college). This makes sense - they are not part of public life. They have no voice. They don't hear the debates. They aren't exposed to much beyond their narrow worlds. And, for most of them, their parents aren't involved either.

@dougthomas: Teens; what are their thoughts about downloading songs? films? software? without paying for it.

They want access. Their parents won't pay for it. They don't have credit cards. They get what they are looking for by any means necessary. And those who get access to it traffic in that content among their peers who may be less technologically savvy/economically privileged.

@jamesb: how does their mobile contacts differ from social network contacts? When do they crossover?

Mobile consists of their closest friends because of the economics of the phone. Social network sites are their broader peer group. Their closest friends are a subset of their broader peer group.

@alfredtwo: Do teens view all adults in social networking the same or are parents a special case? Young relatives friend me not their parents

Depends on the teen, but many are happy to connect with adults who don't directly hold power over them or who they "trust" - aunts, older cousins, youth pastors, "cool" teachers, etc.

@mjmantey: how aware are they of general advertising/marketing ways and means?

If it has advertising, they think that it means that it'll be free for a long time. But they don't really think much about it.

@mojo_girl: how many email accounts do they have that parents don't know about- do they use same password 4 all #socialmedia ? #teens

They don't use email so it's more a matter of which ones they forgot about. They often forget their passwords so I would guess that they don't use the same password consistently. Of course, they also share certain passwords with their closest "trusted" friends so that gets messy really fast. And they change it when there's a breakup.

@matlockmatlock: OMGSEXTINGWTF?

Continuing to be present and very very messy. Sharing of naked photos seems to be more prevalent in certain teen groups than others and I'm still trying to work out what this means.

Original Post: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2009/05/16/answers_to_ques.html

Tags:

• danah boyd
• digital living
• online behaviour
• social media
• teens
• Twitter
• young

Great use of the site around the player

Honda Shine on Viemo makes an excellent use of the whole space to really make the video experience seem bigger: http://vimeo.com/4281939

Social media's emerging communications model

Thanks WARC for this insight on models in the social media space.

Carlos Grande
WARC Online

Of the many trends which have arisen to challenge existing models of brand communications, online social media is one of the most important.

By publishing the report, "Social Media Futures - The future of advertising and agencies in a networked society", written by the Future Foundation, the UK-based Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) has joined a debate on two central questions about the phenomenon:

• Does social media require a new model for brand communications?
• If so, how can agencies put this into practice?

What follows is a summary of some of the report's findings and of a related public discussion, hosted by the IPA, together with some recent WARC Online articles in this area.

The full Social Media Futures report is available for purchase from the IPA.

Introduction

Social media's impact has been fast, sizeable and international, as indicated by a recent report




UK social networkers also tend to visit the same handful of websites. When Ofcom, the UK media regulator, asked respondents which of their online profiles they updated most often, 49% said Facebook, followed by 21% MySpace and 19% Bebo. Other sites barely registered. This consolidated pattern - with variations for strong local players such as Orkut in Brazil - is increasingly being found in other markets.

The peculiarly participatory and user-centric nature of social media sites has been well documented. Furthermore, there is evidence, albeit ambiguous, that as part of overall growth in online usage - itself driven by social networking's surge - some consumers report spending less time with some established media (especially print), a trend reported by research from the European Interactive Advertising Association.

The upshot of all these combined factors is that social networking sites have the potential to become large-scale, interactive branding channels at a time when consumers' media habits are changing. But examples of successful social media marketing have been strikingly absent in both number and quality.

The IPA/FF report quotes one estimate that Facebook will earn about $5 per user per year in 2009 advertising revenue. This is a poor return for the estimated 3,000 minutes per year the average Facebooker will spend on the site. Although McDonald's, Sony, Dove, Channel 4, Intel and Aquafresh have all been among those advertisers which have bucked the trend, there have been many high profile instances of social media initiatives which flopped.

The problem is not a shortage of available formats, which the report groups into five broad categories: from the UK communications regulator, Ofcom. In the UK, for example, networking websites have achieved significant reach among both genders - and not just among 15-24 year olds.

• Interruption: display ads, pre-roll video, tagging, email
• Engagement: viral film, online programming, affiliate marketing, competitions, promotions, word of mouth
• Participation: brand blogs, community sites, branded environments, bulletin boards, online surveys
• Facilitation: branded applications, third party blogs, widgets, fan campaigns
• Conversation: brand conversations; brand defence.

But the common theme among these formats is that audiences cannot be planned, bought or measured for such campaigns as they could by using mainstream media formats. This means that even if the medium's promise is that of a high-impact, low-cost channel, the danger is it will prove high-waste and low-impact.

The report's authors have therefore attempted to précis current theories on how influence and content permeates online social networks, and to suggest basic principles for the media and creative strategies best suited to the genre.

At the outset they quote the analogy, used by blogger David Armano, for the way content or information spreads among people. Armano compares this to a series of serial ripples in a pool which are formed each time content is distributed. These can be classified according to levels of influence:

• Level 1: mainstream media
• Level 2: open networks such as blogs, feeds, websites etc
• Level 3: closed networks such as Facebook, MySpace
• Level 4: distribution via individuals and email lists.

In this scheme, all ripples are potentially valuable since mainstream "ripples" can be fewer and broader in reach, but smaller ripples can be more frequent, lower cost and more targeted.

Using a trawl of academic studies, the report identifies five areas as most relevant to understanding the way communications work in online social networks.


1. Targeting

Unsurprisingly, much academic research has argued that social networkers' behaviour is closely correlated to the degree to which they are at the centre or the periphery of a group of connected users. This has underpinned the belief that social networks contain key influencers who "sit between the most other people or who are directly connected to the most people". Such influencers can be categorized by the general roles they perform.

Other studies have identified different numbers of social media types; the IPA/FF study describes three built around a trio of core characteristics:

• Gossips: the expansiveness of a user and how many other individuals a user habitually communicates with.
• Editors: a user's propensity to filter and target the messages he or she receives and send these on.
• Belongers: - the willingness of a user who receives a message to pass this message on to a third party.

Academic researchers have argued that "Gossips" are disproportionately likely to be the original sources of a message and are therefore "good people to seed a message with". Conversely, "Editors" are popular recipients of a message, originated elsewhere, because, by filtering and targeting, they ensure the efficient dispersal of a message across the network. "Belongers" are defined by their willingness to join the group in question, thereby increasing the "networked" reach of conversations.

The authors write "it is clear that the choice of key players for dispersing a message through a network depends on more than the individual characteristics of each person; the optimum combination must be sought".

It should be said that a previous Ofcom report categorises these segments differently, such as "Alpha Socialisers" and "Attention Seekers", and also attributes broad demographic characteristics to them.

2. How messages travel

Users on social media websites are not aware that they are forming networks in this way and may even by opposed to the idea to be seen as any kind of conduit. Nevertheless, some common-sense principles seem to shape interactions across the network.

For instance, a user who receives a message via one particular link (for instance, from a work colleague) is most likely to forward it via a similar link (namely to another work colleague).

Like attracts like, with users of similar age, language and location communicating more often with each other than with members of different sub-groups. But referrals can also jump between groups which appear only weakly related.

3. Small world

Informal, online networks tend to range in size up to 100 individual contacts (sometimes described as nodes) since "an individual communicating through a network of more than 100 nodes becomes more like a social commentator, less like an informal social contact".

This is still a larger number of contacts than the nearest equivalent network in the offline world would typically hold. However "Friend-ing fatigue" is a common complaint, and it is likely that the longer social networkers use a site, the greater their propensity to maintain active links with a more manageable number of contacts, whilst culling others.

Social networkers also tend to see their contacts as layers - stretching from the global, through layers of greater intimacy and knowledge, towards core clusters of established contacts and peers with whom communication is regular and informal.

In an echo of the "six degrees of separation" theory, the report also cites a 2008 analysis of a month's worth of anonymous data sent across Microsoft's instant messenger system (totaling some 30bn conversations) which found that the average path length of messages was indeed about 6.6 users.

4. Messaging priorities

In this context, two main variables tend to show how efficiently and accurately messages flow across the network.

• Relevance: ideas do not need to be contagious, but they do need to affect a critical mass of the audience.
• Clarity: clarity of the initial message diminishes with each progressive step it travels, turning communications into a type of Chinese Whispers.

5. Theory into Practice

By applying greater understanding of consumers' behaviour in networks, it should, theoretically, be possible to create communications which have a high impact on targets, with little wastage and at relatively low cost. Although views vary on this, it should also be possible to treat social media as another channel alongside traditional media, albeit one with a distinct character.

Some studies suggest that analysis of networkers' behaviour can also provide indications as to their brand preferences, or their more general receptiveness to a particular brand's messaging. The authors quote academic research which found that "Consumers with joint membership in a [brand] subgroup…for one good, are more likely to prefer the same brand for other goods than are those consumers who belong to a different or to sub-group".

Media planners have several other factors to consider. First, to be dispersed globally, messages must first be passed on locally within small-subgroups and networks. Relevance to an appropriate set of targets is therefore key. However, brands must also be prepared in the event that a message, originating locally with a small sub-group, widens out into a much broader audience reach.

For planning purposes, it is important to remember too that an individual contact who likes to chatter will chatter first to individuals directly connected to him or her. Finding the right place to seed messages is therefore vital. And since it is difficult to find the optimum number of key players for a message to reach, it is more important to choose the number of individuals to seed with, rather than the most influential individual/community with which to seed material.

Creatively, the use of pictorially rather than text-led campaigns leaves brands less vulnerable to distortion via the "Chinese Whispers" effect. The use of a sequential or piecemeal message is also high-risk, since there is no guarantee that all the necessary messages in a series will be relayed to sufficient users.

The report summarises these details into the following planning rules:




Discussing the findings

A discussion on the report's themes featured contributions from John Wilshire, Head of Innovation, PHD Media; Charles Wells, MD of Kinship Networking; Cheryl Calverley, Marketing Manager, Unilever; Nigel Gwilliam, Communities Senior Manager, IPA.

Points that emerged from the discussion included:

• Social media can be deployed using many of the same agency skills as are applied in traditional media such as the creation of compelling content to increase "talkability".
  
  
• However, measurement of social media impact remains difficult; observation, comparison and experimentation are likely to be the order of the day for some time.
  
  
• Regulations applied to traditional media advertising will increasingly be applied to online social media.
  
  
• Social media may change the way advertisers pay for branded content; it may also lead to roles such as monitoring and management of online chatter being done in-house or by PR-led agencies.
  
  
• The internet and technology generally brings the threat that agencies will be disintermediated by technologists (the archetypal "12 year-olds in a garage"), but agencies' skill in managing client relationships will still count.
  
  
• The majority of chatter about brands may originate outside brand-owners in future.
  
  
• Brands should take an inclusive and humble approach to brand chatter rather than "wade in and chat". They should remember that a brand's "relationship with a consumer is so much less important to that consumer than the relationship to help speed that change".

Related articles on WARC Online:

• Forum - How does Web 2.0 stretch traditional influencing patterns?
• Social media explained
• Should you advertise on social networking websites?
• The Relationship between Consumer Social Networks and Word-of-Mouth Effectivenes

Related case studies

• Aquafresh - Iso-Active launch
• Caterer.com - Little Gordon
• Making the BRAVIA brand famous through effective social network media
• Cadbury - Wispa re-launch
  

About the author:

			Carlos Grande is editor of WARC Online. He can be contacted at carlos.grande@warc.com. He joined WARC in 2008 after eight years at the Financial Times, where he was latterly marketing correspondent. Previously, he was acting deputy on the FT's UK companies newsdesk and a senior UK companies reporter. Prior to that, Carlos edited Creative Business, the FT's weekly print section and website covering media, marketing, advertising, PR and technology.

Digital Industry Statistics

Thanks Bazaarvoice for this great online stat rundown (mixed markets, dates, etc)

Power of Word of Mouth

• "Person like me" still most trusted source for information about a company and, therefore, products. (Edelman Trust Barometer, November 2007)
• Recommendations from family and friends trump all other consumer touchpoints when it comes to influencing purchases, according to ZenithOptimedia. (AdAge, April, 2008)
• Recommendation is the number one reason for choosing a particular site. (Royal Mail's Home Shopping Tracker Study, September 2007)
• Users who contribute product reviews or post messages visit sites nine times as often as noncontributors do. Contributors also make purchases nearly twice as often. (McKinsey & Co./Jupiter Media Metrix study, January 2002)
• Review users noted that reviews generated by fellow consumers had a greater influence than those generated by professionals. (comScore/The Kelsey Group, October 2007)
• Adult Internet users surveyed chose recommendations from friends as the one type of promotion they consider most worthwhile. (DoubleClick, May 2007)
• Consumers trust friends above experts when it comes to product recommendations (65% trust friends, 27% trust experts, 8% trust celebrities). (Yankelovich)
• Consumers say that word of mouth is still the number one influencer in their apparel (34.3%) and electronics (44.4%) purchases (Retail Advertising and Marketing Association/BIGresearch Study, November 2008)
• According to a global Nielsen survey of 26,486 Internet users in 47 markets, consumer recommendations are the most credible form of advertising among 78% of the study's respondents. (Nielsen, "Word-of-Mouth the Most Powerful Selling Tool", October 2007)
• The two leading reasons people contribute content to social shopping sites are the need to feel part of a community (31%) and recognition from peers (28%). (IBM Institute for Business Value, August 2007)
• Online social network users were three times more likely to trust their peers' opinions over advertising when making purchase decisions. ("Social Networking Sites: Defining Advertising Opportunities in a Competitive Landscape," JupiterResearch, March 2007)
• 86.9% of respondents said they would trust a friend's recommendation over a review by a critic, while 83.8% said they would trust user reviews over a critic. (Marketing Sherpa, July 2007)
• Two thirds of UK social networkers (66%) are more likely to buy a product as a result of a recommendation, compared to 52 per cent of non-social networkers. (Royal Mail's Home Shopping Tracker Study, September 2007)
• Tech decision makers give user-generated sites equal importance to traditional media sources when considering tech purchases. Decision makers consider their personal experience (58%) first when short-listing tech vendors, followed by word-of-mouth and industry analyst reports, tied at 51%. Advertising (17%) and direct marketing (21%) were listed as the least important information sources when short-listing possible vendors. (Study: "Tech Decision Maker," Hill & Knowlton, January 2009)

Consumer Demand for Ratings and Reviews

• Online reviews are second only to personal advice from a friend as the driver of purchase decisions; user reviews are more influential than third-party reviews. ("Web users and web community," Rubicon Consulting, Inc. October 2008)
• 81% of online holiday shoppers read online customer reviews (Nielson Online, December 2008)
• 86% of consumers read online business reviews before making purchasing decisions; 90% of whom say they trust these reviews. (Kudzu.com survey of 600 users, December 2008)
• The Trust in Advertising survey of 26,000+ found that Consumer Recommendations are the most credible form of advertising. ("Social Media Marketing: The Right Strategy for Tough Economic Times" Awareness, 2008)
• Nearly 49% of shoppers have made a purchase based on a recommendation through a social media property; respondents most relied on the following sources when making a purchase decision: 60.53% user reviews; 20.48% comparison charts; 15.41% editorial reviews; 3.58 shared shopping lists. (Razorfish, October 2008)
• Almost two-thirds (62%) of consumers read consumer-written product reviews on the Internet. (Deloitte & Touche, September 2007)
• When asked what sources of information they are "very likely" to consult before making a decision about their entertainment options, 62% named Web sites with user reviews as their top choice, even beating out a knowledgeable friend (59%). (Marketing Sherpa, July 2007)
• 46% of Britons now read online reviews or recommendations on a specific product before buying it and 32% are willing and able to publish a review online - but only 19% would be prepared to write a letter to a retailer. (1&1 Internet survey of 1600 consumers, December 2008)
• Seven in 10 (69%) consumers who read reviews share them with friends, family or colleagues, thus amplifying their impact. (Deloitte & Touche, September 2007)
• As of October 2008, almost half of US online adults read ratings and reviews at least once a month, and 19% post them. Nearly twice as many read reviews compared with 2007. (The Growth Of Social Technology Adoption, Forrester, October 2008)
• Nearly half (49%) of shoppers intend to do their holiday gift buying online (versus in-store), and 72% are planning to research products online prior to purchasing (vs. 65% in 2007). ("Mindset of the Multi-Channel Shopper Holiday Survey," e-tailing group, October 2008)
• 74% agree-including 14% who strongly agree-that they choose companies and brands based on what others say online about their customer service experiences, the survey shows. (Society for New Communications Research, May 2008)
• 58.7% of shoppers said they used product reviews to make decisions. Reviews rated higher than clearance sale pages (56.4%) and featured sale pages (51.3%). (Shop.org, November 2007)
• Compared to a base group that didn't read or contribute product reviews at all, people who read a review were 30% more likely to purchase a product and visitors who wrote a review were 80% more likely to convert, based on analysis across several Coremetrics clients. (Coremetrics, reported in BtoB, March 2007)
• Among the 46% of respondents who had posted or planned to post reviews about their online shopping experience, 88% said those reviews either were, or would be positive. (Nielson, 2007)
• More than eight in ten (82%) of those who read reviews said that their purchasing decisions have been directly influenced by those reviews. (Deloitte & Touche, September 2007)
• 55% of surveyed Internet users consulted other people's opinions online, making reviews the #1 resource for product research. (Avenue A/Razorfish "Digital Consumer Behavior Study," October 2007)
• In a study of 2,000 shoppers, 92% deemed customer reviews as "extremely" or "very" helpful. (eTailing Group, 2007)
• 59% of their users considered customer reviews to be more valuable than expert reviews. (Bizrate, October 2007)
• 63% of consumers indicate they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has product ratings and reviews. (Major consumer electronics retailer/iPerceptions study, January 2008)
• 81% consider the availability of customer reviews to be "very important" (33%)"somewhat important" (48%). (Major consumer electronics retailer/iPerceptions study, January 2008)
• 86.9% of respondents said they would trust a friend's recommendation over a review by a critic, while 83.8% said they would trust user reviews over a critic. (MarketingSherpa, October 2007)
• 84% of consumers earning more than $150,000 annually visit sites where customers review and rate products and services including restaurants. (The Luxury Institute, April 2007)
• 71% of UK online shoppers seek out ratings and reviews. (NetExtract, 2007)
• 70% of online consumers said they use the Internet to research everyday grocery products. (Prospectiv, January 2008)
• 67% of UK consumers research products via the Internet before shopping in a store. (Accenture, April 2007)
• 91% of millionaires say they always or often look at reviews before buying luxury goods; 68% of ultra-affluent shoppers use consumer reviews. (Unity Marketing/Google study, reported in AdAge, October 2008)
• Mobile user-generated content will generate $5.7 billion worldwide in 2012, up from $576 million in 2007. ("Mobile Social Networking: Opportunities & Forecasts 2008-2013," Juniper Research, October 2008)
• Satisfaction for those who recalled customer reviews on the retailers' site is 10% higherLoyalty increases, too: 7% higher likelihood to purchase online, 8% greater likelihood to purchase from the retailer next time they're buying similar merchandise and 11% greater likelihood to recommend the site to others. (30 UK Online Retail Satisfaction Index, ForeSee Results, January 2008) than those who said there were no reviews offered.
• 83% of shoppers said online product evaluations and reviews influenced their purchasing decisions. (Opinion Research Corporation, an infoGROUP company, July 2008)
• In an online survey of 4,000 consumers, 70% said they had done internet research on "everyday grocery products," and 63% said they had done so for health and beauty products. (Prospectiv, 2007)
• 57.2% of U.S. toy purchasers are influenced by product reviews online. (Ad-ology Media Influence on Consumer Choice, Fall 2008)

Marketer Demand for Ratings and Reviews

• 79% of online UK retailers surveyed reported that the main benefit of consumer-generated rating and reviews was that they improved site conversion rates. (eMarketer, 2007)
• 68% of online marketers believe "media is in big trouble and will lose dollars to user-generated content." (iMedia Connection, February 2008)
• 58% of the E-Commerce Guide 100 retailers implemented ratings and reviews in 2008, up from 50% in 2007; 24 percent sell by top-rated products. (e-tailing group's 11th Annual Mystery Shopping Survey, January 2009)
• 84% of marketers agree that building customer trust will become marketing's primary objective (1to1 Media survey of the 1to1 Xchange panel, April 2008)
• 43% of retailers have reviews - double in one year. (Marketing Sherpa, February 2007)
• 76% of US retailers said user-generated content would have a greater impact on their marketing goals in the near future. (SLI Systems/Zoomerang, November 2008)
• Of merchants who adopt customer reviews, 58% said improving customer experiencecompetitive advantage was the most important reason for adding reviews to their sites, followed by building customer loyalty (47%), driving sales (42%), and maintaining a (37%). (eTailing Group, June 2008)
• By 2020, 84% of marketers agree that building customer trust will become marketing's primary objective, and 82% agree that collaboration with customers will prevail over marketing. (1to1 Media survey of the 1to1 Xchange panel, April 2008)
• 11% of retailers reported a 20% or more overall increase in conversions as a result of adding reviews to their sites, 21% reported an 11% to 20% increase and 5% reported a 1% to 10% increase. (eTailing Group, June 2008)
• 81% of marketers surveyed say that their social media spending will meet or exceed their traditional advertising spending within the next 5 years. (TWI Surveys/Society for New Communications Research, November 2007)
• 56% of UK website owners say that user-generated content lifts conversion levels; 77% say it increases traffic; and 42% say it increases the average spend on site.(eConsultancy survey of 360 website owners across all sectors, November 2008)
• Dave Seifert of Bass Pro Shops noted at a Shop.org round table discussion that Top Rated Products were "the #1 merchandising technique ever utilized on their site." (Bass Pro Shops, June 2008)
• After their order, PETCO asked customers, "What online tool most influenced your purchase decision?" The #1 answer was product ratings and reviews, with site search coming in a distant second. (PETCO, June 2007)
• The Shop.org State of Retailing Online study, conducted by Forrester Research, found only 26% of the 137 top retailers surveyed offered customer ratings and reviews, but 96% of them ranked customer ratings and reviews as an effective or very effective tactic at driving conversion. (Forrester, 2007)

Consumer Demand for Ask & Answer™

• 76% of online shoppers surveyed report that content is insufficient to complete research or purchase online "always, most often or some of the time." (eTailing Group, June 2007)
• Online businesses lose as many as 67% of consumers due to a lack of online product information. (Allurent, January 2008)
• 83% of online shoppers would make purchases if sites offered increased interactive elements. (Allurent, January 2008)
• One in four (24.5%) shoppers said they left a store because of a lack of assistance. (Shop.org, November 2007)
• 90% of UK shoppers surveyed said they wish they could communicate directly with businesses - using live chat, forums or call-me-back facilities - via their websites; one in three require it from the UK businesses they currently use. (1&1, October 2007)
• 42% of consumers said they prefer being able to find the answers they need online on their own if they had a question or wanted help while shopping online. (Harris Interactive, May 2007)
• The share of traffic to question-and-answer Web sites has more than doubled from 2007 to 2008 (HitWise, 2008)
• Yahoo Answers had 25.3 million visits in February 2008 (comScore Media Metrix, March 2008)
• 68% of consumers trust "people like me" first for product advice. (Edelman Trust Barometer, January 2007)
• 42% of 1,179 online consumers surveyed have left a site without purchasing multiple products because they couldn't get a question answered about one of the products in their shopping cart; 41% decided not to make a planned purchase because they couldn't readily find a piece of information about the product or service. (JupiterResearch, September 2007)

Conversion Results

• MarketingExperiments tested product conversion with and without product ratings by customers. Conversion nearly doubled, going from .44% to 1.04% after the same product displayed its five-star rating. (MarketingExperiments Journal, July 2007)
• 79% of online UK retailers surveyed reported that the main benefit of consumer-generated rating and reviews was that they improved site conversion rates. (eMarketer, 2007)
• Online shoppers who look at TripAdvisor reviews on the Hayes & Jarvis site book trips at double the rate of online shoppers who have not seen the TripAdvisor reviews, based on first four months after launch. (TripAdvisor, January 2008)
• Shoppers who browsed the site's new "Top Rated Products" page, which features products rated most highly by customers, had a 59% higher conversion rate than the site average and spent 16% more per order than other browsers of products. (Bass Pro Shops, June 2008)
• Shoppers who browsed the site's "Top Rated Products" page, which features products rated most highly by customers, had a 49% higher conversion rate than the site average and 63% more per order than other site shoppers. (PETCO, June 2007)
• Giving shoppers the ability to sort products within a category by customer rating led to a sales increase of 41% per unique visitor. (PETCO, June 2007)

Average Order Value Results

• Consumers were willing to pay between 20 to 99% more for a 5-star rated product than for a 4-star rated product, depending on the product category. (comScore/Kelsey, October 2007)
• Top-rated products site navigation path featuring 4- and 5-star products in each category delivered 35% higher conversion and 40% higher average order value. (Bazaarvoice, June 2007)
• Reviews usage drives higher spending: 27% of users report an increase of 5-10%; almost 7% report an increase of 20%+. (Avenue A/Razorfish "Digital Consumer Behavior Study," October 2007)

User-generated Content Beyond the Web

• 64% of Social Researchers (those who refer to user-generated content when shopping) research products online more than half the time, no matter where they ultimately buy the product (store, Web, catalog, etc.). (eTailing Group, June 2007)
• Online consumers are becoming precision shoppers. For every $1 in online sales, the Internet influenced $3.45 of store sales. (eMarketer, 2007)
• 90% of those surveyed say they have a better overall shopping experience when they research products online before shopping in-store. (Harris Interactive, October 2007)
• 92.5% of adults said they regularly or occasionally research products online before buying them in a store. (BIGresearch, November 2008)
• Nearly one out of every four Internet users (24%) reported using online reviews prior to paying for a service delivered offline. (comScore/The Kelsey Group, October 2007)
• More than three-quarters of review users in nearly every category reported that the review had a significant influence on their purchase, with hotels ranking the highest (87%). (comScore/The Kelsey Group, October 2007)
• 97% of those surveyed who said they made a purchase based on an online review said they found the review to have been accurate. (comScore/The Kelsey Group, October 2007)
• Consumers who shop online for digital cameras and TVs spend 10% more on in-store purchases than consumers who do not search online. (ChannelForce for Yahoo Search Marketing, July 2007)

Email Campaign Results

• Email study: PETCO realized a 5X increase in email click-through rates by including relevant ratings and reviews content in the campaign promotion. (PETCO, June 2007)
• Top rated product email drive 46% higher revenue per email in A/B test. (Golfsmith, June 2007)

Search Engine Optimization Results

• In a study of a major electronics retailer site of 30,000 monthly natural language search visitors, converted 60% more often, spent 50% more, and viewed 82% more pages than search visitors to other pages. (Bazaarvoice case study with major electronics retailer)
• In a study of online UK retailers, 59% reported that the consumer-generated activity leads to better search engine optimization. (eMarketer, 2007)

Return Rates and Customer Satisfaction

• During the 2007 holiday season, consumers who recalled seeing customer reviews on a Web site reported 9% higher customer satisfaction levels, were 9% more likely to make a purchase and 8% more likely to purchase the next time they came to that site. (ForeSee Results, January 2008)
• Reviews drive 21% higher purchase satisfaction and 18% higher loyalty. (Foresee Results Study, January 2007)
• Online UK retailers reported improved customer retention and loyalty by 73% once they implemented consumer-generated rating and reviews. (eMarketer, 2007)
• Products with reviews have a 17% lower return rate than those without reviews. (Bazaarvoice PETCO Case Study, 2007)
• Products with 50+ reviews have a return rate that is half of those with fewer than five reviews. (Bazaarvoice PETCO Case Study, 2007)
• One study from IBM Institute for Business Management shows that while those adults in the UK who use social networking do so to attain a feeling of community, 17% of the adults surveyed say they do so because they like to participate with brands they favor. (IBM, August 2007)

Evolution of Advertising and Media

• 75% of people don't believe that companies tell the truth in advertisements. (Yankelovich)

Search

• SearchVoice study: of 30,000 monthly SearchVoice visitors, they convert 60% higher, spend 50% more and viewed 82% more pages. (Major electronics retailer case study, August 2008)
• The ability to refine site search results by customer rating led to 22% more sales per unique visitor on a same-session basis and 41% more sales per visitor on a multi-session basis. (Bazaarvoice)

Syndication

• RSS study: Burpee measured a 43% higher click-through on RSS feeds with reviews than without. (Burpee, December 2007)

Industry Articles

Positives About Negative Product Reviews. Worried about opening your company to consumer reviews? Don't be. (iMedia Connection)

Getting a Handle on Customer Reviews
These days, what the customer thinks is hardly a secret. Consumer reviews and ratings are popping up on a growing number of Web sites, sites on which users treat brands like contestants on American Idol. (Brandweek)

Online Influence Tied to Search, Social Media Use
According to a new research report by Yahoo! and Comscore, not only is social networking's influence on marketing growing, but particularly vocal individuals are having more of an effect than ever. (ClickZ)

CGM Changes Minds of Online Auto and Travel Buyers
Consumer Generated Media not only influences online consumers, it can get them to change their minds. (ClickZ)

Kachingle Coordinates Microdonations to Get Content Creators Paid

Thanks again PSFK

February 19, 2009

Kachingle is a new service that looks like it could bridge the gap between scattered micropayments and free content. Many old media pundits have been suggesting micropayments as a solution to monetizing dying newspapers and other online content, but historically, micropayments don’t do as well as they should. It’s a hassle to pay every time you want to read an article, and you can often find the same content for free elsewhere.

Kachingle acts as a distributor of microdonations. Member sites would sign up and place a Kachingle badge on their page. Readers pledge to send a monthly payment to Kachingle - $5.00, $10.00, $100.00 or whatever they want. Then, Kachingle distributes that money proportionately amongst the partner sites you’ve visited over the month. So, if you visited PSFK 50 times, and The New York Times 50 times, your pledge would be split evenly, and so on.

It’s a smart concept that simplifies the act of micropayment, or micropatronage. With one payment and a once monthly transaction, you can support your favorite sites. Though critics don’t think Kachingle will make a ton of money for its member sites, it could - combined with advertising - make for a healthy revenue stream.

[Editor and Publisher & Steve Outing via Klintron]

Interactive e-cast Sharpie billboards

Thanks to Australian Cool Hunter for this post... however, I'm not sure that being allowed and even encouraged to graffiti something in a public space really "satiates" the desire to deface public property as their article suggests. But it is still a nice interactive idea with semi-product demo thrown in. Actually, it reminds me of the Adidas Adicolour campaign detailed here and pictured just below which was much better in my opinion.
Many of us have a fascination with graffiti art, and we sometimes look over our shoulders to make sure no one's watching when we scratch our initials in a freshly laid slab of concrete, or carve them into a wooden desk, or even scribble profanities across the stall door in a public toilet.
The creative minds working for Sharpie, the ultimate in permanent markers have discovered a way to satiate our desires to deface public domain. Interactive e-cast billboards have been scattered around cities, which allow people to experience the rush of creating their own graffiti. Choose some colours, write a message and Sharpie makes it possible for anyone to leave his permanent mark on the side of the bus stop or the public phone or anywhere else billboard advertising may be experienced.

Yes - it's bubblevertising

http://flogos.net/downloads.html#

Love it

SnapAds: Survival Of The Fittest Meets Madison Avenue

Thanks TechCrunch for this outline of SnapAds, a new offering in the automated, multivairant ad delivery market. Looks useful, but not sure how they compare to something like memetircs

It’s rare to hear about genetics and advertising platforms in the same sentence, but new startup SnapAds has put together an ad service that effectively combines the theory of natural selection with banner ads - with very impressive results. The startup, which shares a number of founders with Weebly (though the two companies are unrelated), has created a system that dynamically adjusts the appearance of banner ads over time to maximize engagement. And it seems to work - a three day trial campaign for a recent film saw an increased clickthrough rate of 1922% over three days (not a typo).

To create a campaign, advertisers provide SnapAds with a special Photoshop file containing a number of specially-tagged layers with all of the art and text assets they’d like to potentially display in their banner. Advertisers can create rule sets specifying which layers are allowed to appear together, allowing them to ensure that SnapAds never generates an ad that is nonsensical or potentially offensive. Once all of the rules and assets are in place, the platform can get to work.

SnapAds - Display Ad Optimization from SnapAds on Vimeo.

The process initially begins by displaying ads with a smattering of random combinations of the assets. As time goes by, the system identifies the most successful ads and allows these to “live on”, further modifying them towards perfection as the failures die off. Co-Founder David Rusenko says that a fully refined ad takes around one million impressions, but that the system never stops optimizing. Because user interest in an ad will typically wane after it’s been seen multiple times, SnapAds will continue to modify the ad indefinitely. The platform can also recognize when certain ads are more successful at different times, and will keep multiple branches of an ad “alive”, showing each at the appropriate time.

Rusenko says that to use the service advertisers will need campaigns consisting of at least 1 million impressions (SnapAds is not currently self-service), and that each ad is recommended to have 3-6 variables with 2-8 possible values each. Today’s announcement coincides with the launch of a SnapAds-powered campaign on Reddit and Wired for the AXE Detailer (man loofah).

While the initial results are promising, it’s too early to tell just how successful SnapAds will be. The system isn’t magic - it can’t automatically generate a new, especially appealing button or image. These assets will all need to be provided by the advertiser, and if there is nothing innovative to work with, SnapAds will only be able to offer slightly different permutations of the same generic ad. That said, provided the ad agencies can come up with a little creativity, the SnapAds service could prove to be very successful.

What the Semantic Web -- or Web 3.0 -- Can Do for Marketers

Thanks adage for this article on marketing applications of web 3.0 - bring on the relevance!

Whatever You Call It, Get Ready for Greater Relevance

Posted by Marta Strickland on 11.24.08 @ 03:16 PM

It's been nearly 10 years since Tim Berners-Lee, who is credited with inventing the worldwide web, expressed his vision of a "semantic web," in which all web data -- and the meaning of that data -- could be read by machines. Since then, much of the slow-moving progress toward this smarter and more powerful web has been courtesy of academics and data librarians.

Recently, however, the semantic web has been enjoying a commercial revival of sorts and is often referred to by the new buzzword "Web 3.0." Given how insane the pace of life is these days, I thought I'd offer a few thoughts on what I've been learning about it.

Since I can already feel the rising tide of negative comments as that version number graces the screen, bear with me for a second. Semantic web is just one of a few things often referred to as Web 3.0 -- others include topics like data portability or mobile web. But I think entrepreneur Nova Spivack offered the most useful definition by simply calling it the third decade of the web (2010 to 2020) and referring to the technology trends that will hit maturity during that time. Most importantly, the next generation of the web will bring us out of information overload and be more relevant and meaningful.

But Web 3.0 is not just about improving the consumer experience. And it isn't some industry ploy to sell you more services. The next-generation web -- the semantic web -- aims to solve some of today's biggest problems in marketing.

So what is it? Well, semantics refers to the meaning behind data. Right now, computers are good at sending data back and forth but not great at discerning the meaning of that data. Semantic web aims to change that. Perhaps it's best explained in describing what marketers can hope to gain from it.

Improving Ads
Has your contextual advertising turned into a contextual nightmare? Current contextual advertising depends heavily on keywords. Sure, it seems safe to buy a word like "feet" -- until your ad comes up right next to a story about severed feet. What if there were a technology that could analyze what is really being said on the page?

By using natural language processing and artificial intelligence, semantic advertising solutions, like Peer39, can look at the structure of a sentence and interpret word meaning and sentiment. Semantic text analysis relies on synonyms and relationships between concepts, rather than rudimentary keyword scanning. Identifying sentiment is becoming invaluable for advertising on user-generated sites such as blogs, where you wouldn't want to place ads on a negative post.

Online advertising has another obstacle to overcome: information overload. We live in a world where information evolves at an alarming rate and, let's face it, consumers trust each other far more than they trust advertising messaging. So how do we dynamically pull smarter and more relevant content into ads?

That's where the efforts like Dapper MashupAds come into play. In addition to pulling from a brand site database, the dynamically generated ads can scan social content sites like Yelp and Flickr for the newest (positive) reviews and photos of your restaurant. It's the power of your brand message only promoted by your consumers.

Improving Measurement
One of the toughest marketing challenges of recent times has been in measuring the success of social media. How do you measure the success of a human conversation? We can measure reach (visits, views, clicks, downloads). We can also measure exposure or buzz (what people are saying about our brand). But it's inside those walled gardens that everything interesting is happening: How strong is the community? Are members active? Are we changing their minds? Changing their actions?

It's the tough nut of the new marketing conversation, but Web 3.0 might be the key to cracking it.

Semantic technology is able to pull together connections between words and phrases. How often is concept "X" said in the same breath as concept "Y"? Measurement tools will be moving away from the tag cloud, and we'll be able to immerse ourselves in the trends of the real conversation, not just the keyword of the day.

Next, there is the dilemma of message velocity; i.e., how far is my message traveling and how fast? Sure, that's an easy thing to do when you are measuring a viral video or widget but what about a conversation? Semantic technology builds on meaning, not keywords. And so it doesn't matter if your followers say, "The new Batman movie is going to be awesome" or "You have to see the 'Dark Knight' trailer"; semantic buzz tools will tie the conversation together.

Sentiment analysis is an increasingly popular tool in the marketer toolbox. And its next generation will look at the entirety of a comment or an article, from whom it came and to whom it was directed. It will use natural language processing and analysis of meaningful relationships to distinguish the "good" comments from "bad."

And what about building a community of loyal enthusiasts? What about creating a relationship with your customers? Companies like Chat Mine measure the connections between members of the community and between people and concepts. By looking at both friending and popular dialogue, it can tell you if your brand brought a community together in passionate conversation.

When O'Reilly coined the term Web 2.0, the marketing world divided into skeptics and enthusiasts. And a wave of start-ups began rolling out under the 2.0 moniker. It's only wise to fear the same for semantic web or Web 3.0. As nightmares of books and white papers race through your mind, it's important to separate the reality from the hype.

The successful technologist won't approach the marketer with buzzwords. He won't throw out phrases like "dynamic ontologies" or "semantic triples." Because good semantic technology is like movie editing -- you aren't supposed to notice it's there but it fundamentally changes the experience. So when someone approaches you about a "smarter" semantic solution, make sure they can answer this:

How will this make my ads more relevant and my metrics more meaningful?

~~~

Marta Strickland is manager of social-media strategy at Organic, Detroit, where she defines best practices on emerging technology trends and discovers new ways to use social media to connect with consumers for brands including Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Bank of America and Geek Squad. She voices her mind and evangelizes the power of social media as editor in chief of the Organic blog ThreeMinds. Prior to Organic, she was interactive strategist for Q LTD, a strategic design consultancy in Ann Arbor, Mich.

Living and Learning with New Media: Findings from a 3-year Ethnographic Study of Digital Youth

Thanks Futurelab for releaseing this report on young people and social media

by: danah boyd

For the last three years, I've been a part of a team of researchers at Berkeley and USC focused on digital youth practices. This project, funded by the MacArthur Foundation, brought together 28 different researchers (led by Mimi Ito and my now deceased advisor Peter Lyman) to examine different aspects of American youth life. As many of you know, I focused on normative teen practices and the ways in which teens engaged in networked publics. We are now prepared to share our findings:

• Two page summary (pdf)
• White Paper - Living and Learning with New Media: Summary of Findings from the Digital Youth Project (pdf)
• Book - Hanging Out, Messing Around, Geeking Out: Living and Learning with New Media

Already, write-ups of our research have hit the press:

• Teenagers’ Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing (NY Times)
• Time online teaches kids important skills, study finds (Mercury News)
• ... and many more

Needless to say, we're excited by our research and uber excited by the coverage that we're getting. For years, we've been finding that youth do amazingly positive things with the technology that they use. Yet, during that time, we've watched as parents and news media continue to focus solely on what is negative. We're hoping that this report will help adults get a decent sense of what's going on.

For those who are only familiar with my research, I strongly encourage you to check out the report to get a better sense of the context in which I've been working. I focus primarily on "friendship-driven practices" but the "interest-driven practices" that motivate creative production, gaming, and all sorts of user generated content are tremendously important. I focus primarily on what happens when teens "hang out" but there's also amazing learning moments when they mess around and geek out with one another.

The book is currently available only in draft form but an updated print version will be available in the future. In the meantime, enjoy, and feel free to ask questions!!

Original Post: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2008/11/20/living_and_lear.html

Tags:

• danah boyd
• new media
• research
• social media
• teens
• young

Online ad spend boom Down Under

Cheers Elizabeth Lloyd at imedaiconnection for this rundown on the state of affairs in the Australian online ad space

The latest figures show Australia has a bright future, both for online advertising opportunities as well as broadband subscriber growth.

According to the International Telecommunication Union, 74.3 percent of Australia's population is online -- out of 20.6 million inhabitants, 15.3 million are online (as of December 2007). With statistics like this, it is no surprise that Australia is one of the top 20 countries with the highest number of internet users.

What is interesting to note is how the internet has changed Australia's traditional media use. The World Internet Project in July 2008 published a report titled "CCi Digital Futures Report: The Internet in Australia" detailing:

• For users, the internet is now their most important source of information. Just under seven in ten users described the internet as 'important' or 'very important' compared to a third for television and less than a half for newspapers or radio. Internet users spend less time watching television, listening to radio and reading newspapers than nonusers.

Advertisers are starting to notice the shift from traditional to digital media -- it is evident in the rising online advertising expenditure. With growing internet penetration rates (in just eight years the number of online users has more than doubled), online advertising expenditure in Australia has showed record quarters. The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) Online Advertising Expenditure Report, which was published in June 2008, states:

• Online advertising expenditure in Australia for the second-quarter of 2008 totalled A$412.5 million, the largest second-quarter recorded. This is an increase of $28 million (or 7.3 percent) from the first-quarter of 2008, and is an increase of $87 million (or 26.7 percent) from the second-quarter of 2007.

What has contributed to increased penetration rates and the shift to digital media for information consumption is growth in the broadband market. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reports that 22.8 percent of Australia's population falls in the broadband subscriber category (as of September 2007) -- just under four in five home connections are broadband.

Broadband does make a substantial difference to peoples' use of the internet. "The internet is more highly valued by those with broadband connections and they use the internet for longer and for a greater variety of purposes. Younger people have been quick to integrate the internet into their lives, they use the internet more and particularly for entertainment," according to the CCi report.

The internet is widely embraced in Australia. However, a digital divide does exist as a fifth of the population has never used it. With or without broadband, internet use varies greatly between different groups. The CCi report has found that "men, students, employed persons, younger people, higher educated and higher income individuals are all more likely to use the internet than women, retired people, home-makers, older people, lower educated and lower income individuals".

Aside from the demographics, what is interesting to note is the type of online media that is receiving the most attention. The IAB report cites that:

• The largest online advertising expenditure was search and directories, which comprised of 45.3 percent, while general display advertising and classifieds advertising accounted for 27.8 percent and 26.9 percent of the total advertising expenditure for the second-quarter of 2008, respectively. Finance, computers and communications, and motor vehicles sectors continue to be the dominant industries using general display advertising, and comprise over 50 percent of the general display spending.

Marketers take note of the online user demographics as well as the dominant sectors in all forms of online media. It is evident that Australia has a very promising future -- both for online advertising opportunities, as well as broadband subscriber growth. Not only does the number of broadband users increase, but online advertising expenditure statistics are very impressive.

Elizabeth Lloyd is co-founder and chief revenue officer, 9Global, Inc.

Digital technologies that will change how you market

By Matthew Klein thanks to iMediaConnection for helpful listings on tomorrow's technologies.

We know that tomorrow's media will be digitally integrated, but what will that media entail? Get the inside view on the next wave of digital media opportunities.

Steve Ballmer predicts that in 2015, there will be no media that is not IP-enabled. In other words, 10 years down the road, there will be no distinction between "traditional" and "digital" when it comes to media.

In this future world, I predict that much of the planning of media will remain the same. There will still be a human side to the equation of planning and negotiation. It is the stewardship that will evolve beyond the tear sheet reporting of traditional media and into the action and behavior tracking of the digital media today.

Print goes digital

Many people in the media believe they are currently witnessing the swan song of the newspaper industry. However, the combination of the advancements in e-paper and the proliferation of ubiquitous Wi-Fi leads me to believe that the newspaper industry will experience a resurgence -- once the term "paper" is redefined through electronics, that is.

Consider that major companies such as LG Phillips, Bridgestone (QR-LPD), Fujitsu (Clerk Browser and Fabric PC), Siemens (color flexible displays for packaging), Samsung (carbon nanotube based e-paper) and even Hearst (FirstPaper) are all moving rapidly towards the development of thin, LCD screens that will one day be flexible enough to roll into one's back pocket. While on the morning commute, people will consume news from The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times or the The Chicago Tribune with the click of a button, all wirelessly transmitted via ubiquitous Wi-Fi networks.

Outdoors gets more interactive

The future of outdoor advertising will also be digital, and thus interactive, according to a presentation, which profiles technology from a company called Catchyoo. Catchyoo is in the "interactive out of home" space, like Reactrix and Bubbloo. It provides not only outdoor interactivity products, but back-office scheduling and remote management software that allows for mass distribution to multiple locations simultaneously. This creates a new media business model for outdoor advertising akin to the way we distribute ads on the web today.

Another example of the digital shift in outdoor comes from Inwindow Outdoor and their Interactive Storescapes. With the ability for people to interact with the outdoor advertisement via motion, speech or Bluetooth, the day will come when media companies are being asked to report on the engagement time, downloads or views generated by their outdoor media buy.

Radio plays

Now, consider the evolution of radio. You've probably seen the Ford Sync commercials profiling technology that is powered by Microsoft Auto. Ford Sync is a voice-activated mobile phone and digital music system for your car. With digital music, the technology is currently taking advantage of what is essentially an in-dash MP3 player or MP3 player plug-in. But with interactive radio, there may come a day that you get into your car and plug a memory card into the dash of your vehicle. As you are driving along, you hear a song you like, but the artist is not announced. With two-way digital radio (check out U.S. Patent # 6990312) and the interactive voice response capabilities that you find in Ford Sync and OnStar, you may simply say "song information" and your radio will read the metadata (yes, as I said in my last article, the word "geek" will be applied to media of the future like never before) from the digital broadcast signal and tell you the artist, title and album. You then say "bookmark" and this information is stored on your SD card for later retrieval.

Translate this capability into the advertising world and you get a scenario much like online marketing today. A commercial comes on the radio, which may be behaviorally, contextually or geographically targeted, and you say "bookmark" because you want to check out the service or product at a later time. The advertising information is stored on your memory card and you continue on your day. Later, you plug your memory card into your home media hub (today's IP-enabled game console) and the day's requested follow-ups are presented in some sort of browse-able format. If we continue the trend we are on today, the advertisement was served via an ad-server with digital radio ad-serving capabilities, so the media company that placed the ad has the ability to report on the number of "listenings," "bookmarks" and "conversions" for a given spot. Forgive the "listening" and "bookmarks" metric term assumptions -- these are to be figured out by the IABs and Web Analytics Associations of the world at a later date.

The new TV

Television has been the medium that is most often referenced when discussing the convergence of IP-based technology and media. Given the technical and adoption hurdles required to implement the digital outdoor, digital print and digital radio visions previously mentioned, interactive TV is also the nearest to becoming a reality.

Cox Communications, Comcast and Time Warner are already experimenting with nascent forms of this in key markets, and are expected to begin implementing targeted, on-demand and personalized forms of advertising through their systems in 2010. Personal TV: The Reinvention of Television is a great whitepaper from Forrester on this topic. Needless to say, one day television advertising will also be targeted, interactive and measurable.

With this future vision in mind, it is clear to see that web standards are becoming advertising standards. The language of online media marketing today is the language of the media marketing of tomorrow.

In my last iMedia article, I discussed how crucial it is that the major components of digital media marketing (online display, email, organic and paid search, mobile and web analytics) must be integrated. It is equally crucial that the digital and the traditional media be planned and managed in an integrated fashion. Today we recognize this because of scenarios such as measuring the traffic of a print or TV ad based on a special URL, ensuring that our paid search is aligned with our offline advertising or measuring the cross-media effectiveness of our whole campaign. But it is even more crucial that traditional and digital is integrated because entrepreneurs and engineers are working diligently to ensure that tomorrow's media will all be digitally enabled.