Broadcast-related web sites may see more advertising dollars thanks to comScore

An ad-hoc coalition of public- and private-sector new media stakeholders has been successful in encouraging comScore Media Metrix Canada to significantly increase its monitoring of Canadian Internet users. The expansion in comScore’s activities could mean that interactive players are able to secure more advertising dollars for broadcast-related web sites, and better bend the ear of government policy-makers for greater public-sector financing. As part of its expansion, comScore will roughly double the number of people it uses in its monitoring panels from around 10,000 to 20,000, and begin reporting at-work and Francophone web usage to provide what are often considered the equivalent of television ratings for the Internet. Ted Bairstow, head of Canadian Heritage’s Canadian Culture Online Program, tells Canadian NEW MEDIA that a group of representatives from the CBC, Telefilm Canada, the Bell Broadcast and New Media Fund and his shop met informally in the weeks following a producers’ summit during the 2003 nextMEDIA festival to find ways of getting better statistics related to Canadian web properties. "Many of the sites that we’re looking at have relatively small traffic compared to people like Sympatico or MSN.ca or things like that. Media Metrix didn’t always find the kind of stuff that we were looking at, and CBC wasn’t all that satisfied with the makeup of the panels - there wasn’t good representation of Francophones, and the at-work time period was underrepresented. That’s the time when lots of people use CBC.ca," says Bairstow. Two parallel tracks have since emerged. Preceding this development, CBC has continued talks with comScore, while Canadian Heritage awaits the results of a needs assessment survey and report it commissioned from marketing firm Phase 5’s Arnie Gouha. That report will be available before next October, Bairstow says. Asked why, given the expansion of comScore’s activities, Heritage continues to pursue the needs assessment survey, Bairstow replies that not only is the department obligated to meet its contract, but that even the larger panels being developed by comScore won’t meet all the industry’s needs. "comScore, while it’s terrific for those sites that get enough traffic to show up, even with the improved panels and all of that is still not going to capture a number of the specialty sites that we fund, and we still want to try and develop some comparable kinds of approaches to measuring those." In the meantime, comScore’s president Brent Lowe-Bernie tells CNM that the broader panels could help Canadian sites catch up to their American counterparts with better measurement data. "We know from current statistics that right now online media spending in the U.S. is 3 to 3.5% of all advertising. In Canada, it’s about 1 to 1.5%. We’re well behind where they are, and I think having more finite or more granular data is part of that." He says he’s confident the Canadian industry will support the broader panels by buying the research. He notes that the new data will allow comScore to measure at-work behaviour, including breaking down the Francophone market’s at-work and at-home activity. For many broadcasters, the numbers will be welcomed with open arms as they continue to struggle to prove the value of their online activities, but new media producers might also look forward to more influence in Ottawa. Says Bairstow: "I think it helps in whatever lobbying efforts they’re going to be involved in, in terms of persuading the policy establishment that they’re a significant industry and that Canadians use their products...The more we have tools that allow us to aggregate how people are using, from our perspective, cultural content on the Internet, the better we can make a case that a significant number of Canadians find this stuff useful. That leads to a stronger case for government support." One analyst who has so far written two reports on the need for a better understanding of the value of broadcast-related interactive properties is also cheering the deal. Catherine Warren, whose recent report Fiscal Reality Television argued for better data mining by broadcasters and interactive content producers, says the news is welcome (CNM, Feb. 20/04). "The ‘day-cording’ (at-work panels) is a very significant requirement for broadcasters that want to understand usage - not just in the front of one box or the other, but how audiences interact with media over the course of a day. Unless you capture the at-work, the statistics have no significance. I think it’s extremely positive, very necessary, and will be most welcomed."

Broadcast-related web sites may see more advertising dollars thanks to comScore

News | 03/17/2004 5:00 am EST

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