Effectv Viewership Report Reveals Important Viewership Trends

Effectv has just released the results of the latest wave of their TV Viewership Report which is published bi-annually and offers marketers a fascinating trend of consumer viewing habits in the Comcast footprint. Data was collected from more than 29 million households whose members watched more than 15 billion hours of TV and from more than 20,000 multiscreen campaigns garnering over 1.5 billion impressions.

The report noted that while insights and data increasingly fuel the way in which TV is planned and bought, marketers increasingly need to know how to best use TV’s reach and precision to be more effective in delivering results.

Highlights from this wave 2H 2021, included:

1.    1.   The majority of streaming viewership happens on the TV Screen which indicates that traditional TV is still strong. The study found that, on average, video consumers in Comcast households were spending more than six hours watching traditional TV daily. But, viewership habits and preferences are shifting to include more devices and services.  Overall, 78% of Effectv Streaming happens on the TV screen. This includes viewing to connected TV, VOD served via an Xfinity set-top box, a mobile app or device and a web browser.

2.    2.   Traditional TV is the foundation of multiscreen campaigns driving a majority of multiscreen campaigns. Notably, 82% of multiscreen campaign reach comes from traditional TV with very little duplication with streaming services.

3.  3.     Sports programming enhances campaigns offering 2.5x more impressions per spot from sports. In fact, 42% of all households reached by sports programming were incremental to the campaign demonstrating the value of audience extensions.

4.   4.    Streaming provides incremental reach to a campaign. In fact, 51% of HHs reached through streaming were incremental to the campaign, overall. The results from more than 20,000 Effectv multiscreen campaigns revealed that over half of the reach from streaming was incremental to the campaign beyond traditional TV reaching light and no traditional TV viewers while also increasing frequency.

5.   6.    Multiscreen benefits exist across audiences. Multiscreen tactics work in similar ways across the audiences advertisers are trying to reach. Unique reach from TV attracts Hispanics, young adults, suburbanites and retires while streaming extends among the well-educated, affluents, rural blue collar and young adults.

Advertisers can best leverage all of the fascinating viewership trends from the study by noting when and where to place their spend. For peak efficiencies, the report also found that peak investment levels in streaming topped at 42% because streaming investment allocation is contingent on the audience. Generally speaking while reach was highest when 20-30% of investment was allocated to streaming, advertisers are advised to consider adjusting their investment within 10-40%, based on audience. Beyond 30%, the benefits from adding streaming were outweighed by a loss of reach.

 

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com

Artwork by Charlene Weisler

 

 

Understanding the Radio Listener with Megan Lazovick of Edison Research, Lamar Johnson of NPM and Susan Leland of NPR

Understanding the different permutations of an audience – their behaviors and preferences - is pivotal to the success of any venture. That’s why NPR, in partnership with Edison Research, crafted a study designed to fully dimensionalize not only NPR’s audience specifically but the radio audience in general. The result is their recently released Radio: Live on Air and Everywhere which teases out six specific and unique radio audience segments, matching them to NPR, to AM/FM Radio listeners and even to Television.

Why Do the Study?

“We really wanted to take a fresh look at the radio platform and the role it plays in people’s lives, particularly to help media buyers,” explained Susan Leland, NPR's Associate Director of Audience Insights. In an increasingly digital world, it was important to prove out that radio is still very important. And it is.

The current state of radio is robust. Leland shared that, “Radio consistently has the largest reach of any media. It was 88% in the latest Nielsen data, just ahead of smartphone apps. It also counts for the largest share of audio listening and when in the car, radio counts for the majority of listening time.” In addition, Edison Research found that 63% of Americans listen to AM/FM radio each day and 89% listen each week.

For NPR in particular, this study comes at a momentous time. “This spring, NPR celebrated its 50th anniversary. We have a great legacy in the radio space,” explained Lamar Johnson, NPM Vice President, Marketing. “Part of that legacy involves having an understanding of the radio listenership and the audience. It is an ongoing objective for us,” he added.

Radio: Live on Air and Everywhere Methodology

NPR and Edison Research used three studies for this report. “First is share-of-ear which is a diary study of over 4,000 people age 14 and older that we conduct in the U.S. quarterly. We measure the amount of time people are spending with audio. That’s how we identified the growth in time spent with spoken word,” explained Megan Lazovick, Vice President, Edison Research who added, “We followed up on that share-of-ear information by conducting some in-depth interviews via zoom. Things that we learned from those in depth interviews were used to put together an additional survey … a national online survey of 1,000 monthly spoken word audio listeners, which is about 75% of the US population.”

Six Unique Radio Audience Segmentations

One of the major takeaways from this study is the clear delineation of the radio audience into six distinct and unique segmentations, each with their own preferences, demographic skew and behavioral patterns. “One of the interesting things about the six groups and the spectrum is that the more engaged group is, the more open they are to advertising,” stated Leland.

Radio Heads. These super fans essentially use radio for everything. They are more likely to be female under the age of 54 and over-index among African Americans. They listen to all formats on all platforms and spend more time with AM/FM than any other segment. Not only are they advertiser-friendly, they have the money to spend to purchase products and services because they have high employment, higher education and higher average income. Radio Heads represent 9% of all radio listeners.

Connection Seekers use radio as a way to connect and understand. They tend to be older women and are the second heaviest users of the medium. They gravitate to the spoken word, tend to listen at home and are also very advertiser-friendly. They represent 16% of all listeners.

Infomaniacs where listening is driven by news, skews male. They tend to listen in the morning, prefer the spoken word and gravitate to formats such as news, sports, personalities and talk. They index high for NPR listening and are open to advertising and sponsorships. They represent 18% of listeners.

Rhythm Rockers whose listening is driven by music, is heavily younger female, Latinx and of lower incomes. They are more likely to stream, but AM/FM is king in the car. They represent 27% of all listeners.

Laid-back Listeners who listen to radio in the background tend to be age 35+ who are radio-centric, preferring to listen on traditional platforms rather than streaming. More than half of this group listen to ads and prefer music over other formats. They are 17% of all radio listeners.

Habitualists listen to radio when it’s the only option available. They also skew 35+ and are not that interested in audio in general. Yet, more than half say that they listen to ads on radio and still spend three hours listening in an average week and would miss radio if it were no longer available. They prefer to listen on traditional platforms and not on streaming ones and their preferred format is music rather than the spoken word. They represent 13% of all listeners.

NPR Listener Segments

For NPR listeners specifically, “You will find them in every segment, but they are particularly likely to be Infomaniacs, which are news driven users, which makes a lot of sense, and they also tend to be pretty heavy listeners,” noted Leland. They're also more likely to be Radio Heads and Connection Seekers. “Our audience tends to be heavy listeners to radio. It keeps some listeners company throughout the day with the news and especially the conversations. It’s like having a friend in your house who's with you all day,” she added. “The thing the thing that most distinguishes the NPR listener on any platform is that they tend to be really interested in learning and have a sense of real civic engagement and responsibility.”

For Johnson, a notable takeaway from the study was, “the increase in listenership among African American Latino and female women listeners, particularly in the younger 13-34. It's important for us at NPR to attract more diverse and younger audiences. Those are two fairly big takeaways that were pretty eye opening for us.”

Open to Advertising

The heavier the listener, the more receptive they are to advertising but, according to Lazovick, all segments of radio listeners, even those who are less engaged, are open to advertising. “They are getting exposed to advertising. They (may not be) as engaged but they are still there they're still open to the messaging, just not as intensely as other segments. The more engaged a group is with radio, the more likely you can influence them with the advertising.”

She added that, “Most people believe that ads are a fair trade for their listening time. They understand the value that they're getting through radio in exchange for listening to a few ads.” When it comes to NPR, “We asked specific questions to NPR listeners and a final key finding is that NPR listeners are very open to sponsorship members’ messages.”

According to Leland, “We asked people on the survey about actions people have taken as a result of hearing advertising and we saw that the more engaged a listener is, more likely they are to say that they considered a product and purchased a product because of an ad they heard on radio.” Lazovick noted, “And because we know NPR listeners tend to be that more engaged listener, their numbers are higher in terms of those same questions about gathering information about a company product or service, purchasing things, recommending products. They are more likely to have done that than the average AM/FM radio listener. The numbers are high on both sides, but NPR listeners are a bit higher.” Local advertising in particular can benefit from a radio presence.

Radio Compared to Television

When it comes to attracting a focused consumer, advertisers are strongly advised to turn to radio. Even compared to television, radio shows superiority in terms of focusing attention. “When we watch TV, most people these days are doing it while they're distracted with another device. They may be watching streaming that doesn't have any advertising and they may be watching broadcast and avoiding the ads by switching to their smartphone. But when people listen to NPR content, they really are engaged,” stated Leland who added, “We find that people are much less likely to multitask when they're listening to our content in part because they are less likely to multitask with other media. They're going to be multitasking other ways - doing chores, cooking dinner, going for a walk - but they're not going to be trying to listen to a conversation on Fresh Air and watch TV at same time. You need to give you the whole attention of your brain.”

Pandemic Impact

While broadcast radio declined early in the pandemic when lifestyles were disrupted, it has been on the upswing and getting back to normal now. “While we saw people shifting away from broadcast radio, we also saw more people tuning into station streams,” Leland noted. In fact, NPR’s listener hours on streams were up from last year. But, as Leland explained, as Americans get back into their cars and commute, there will be a strong return to AM/FM listenership.

Next Steps

This is the first study of its kind for NPR but not the last. “This study was really enlightening to us in terms of understanding the segments and the behaviors. We'll be talking further about what we might do in this lane in the future,” Johnson concluded.

Hulu Knows the Secret of Digital Fluency

If there is one longstanding bias that permeates the media industry, it is that older adults are techno-phobic. We’ve written long analyses as to why that is not so but the overall prejudice still exists … until now. Hulu has just released the second phase of a study that examines digital fluency by consumer segmentation that transcends age.  

What Hulu has found, according to Julie DeTraglia, Hulu’s Head of Research, is that the actual enjoyment of technology is a better indicator of digital fluency than age. She defines digital fluency as, “comfort with technology and a willingness to interact that way with all types of categories and brands.”

The Journey to Understanding

“We really didn’t set out to do this specific type of study,” she explained. Previously, “we did a generational study where we concentrated on the differences in television behavior between Gen X, Gen Y and Gen Z,” and saw differences in television behavior. The intent was to simply do a follow-up to that study, folding in other types of behaviors across other categories, attitudes towards advertising and brand relationships. But, “as we started brainstorming, we realized that it is not just Gen Z that has changed. Everybody has changed,” and this change has occurred across all generations.

What she found was that people of all ages changed behaviors and attitudes, becoming more digitally fluent as opportunities for convenience became available. Her example was Uber; “We were taught from childhood never to get into a car with a stranger. But now we are doing it all the time,” she noted, because of the convenience of on-demand car service.

The Big Takeaway

“So we tried to understand what that journey is and how people identified themselves and the identity they had around technology,” she stated. That study was released last year at Advertising Week. Hulu studied digital behavior and identity and found that the consumer spectrum was segmented in a way that age was essentially a non-issue. According to DeTraglia, “The one thing that moves people across the spectrum is the enjoyment, happiness and inspiration they get from technology,” and this parses out relatively equally across age ranges.

“The more digitally fluent people use technology often and derive a lot of happiness with their digital connections,” she explained, “People in the middle use technology to make their lives easier but they are not necessarily getting joy from it. Then there are those people who we call minimalists who use technology because it’s the way they can get things done, but they don’t really love it.” But, “one of our biggest insights was that age is not a factor,” she confided. Just as many young people as older described themselves as minimalists on the digital spectrum - 19% of Gen Z compared to 16% of Boomers. But why?

“It could be that Gen Z is interpreting the questions differently than older generations,” she posited. “Or maybe they are just a little more overwhelmed by it,” since they are so immersed, for example, in social media that is ‘on’ all the time.

In the second phase of the study, just released in time for this year’s Advertising Week, segmentations were created around motivations and behaviors and “that is where we saw the segmentations flatten out a bit. Most people define themselves a somewhere in the middle, but when you do a segmentation, there were just about equal percentages of all of the segments,” from low to high. DeTraglia noted that technology prompts behavioral change. Take for example streaming video. One might start in the living room, then move into the bedroom and then onto a computer or tablet. Once content becomes available on smart TV’s Hulu saw that consumers transitioned back to the living room.  That then leads to more comfort with technology and can lead to transactions and shopping.

Conclusions

What DeTraglia saw in this brand study phase, was that advertisers should adjust their creative so there is differentiation between the digital fluency segments. “It is no longer one-size-fits-all,” she explained. “Truly digitally fluent people should get different ads,” according to the viewing environment and platform.

“Hulu has worked hard to come up with ad products that can work in different ways, depending on what your needs are. For those who are more digitally fluent, they want messaging that is more personalized. They want to interact with the creative. They want more personal connection and control and relevance,” whereas other less fluent groups just want to be informed with messaging that remains clear. Advertisers, take note.

Surprising TV Trends From Comcast STB Data. An Interview with Heather Coghill

Heather Coghill, Senior Director Audience Insights, Comcast Spotlight has been a fan of set top box data for years. And now, with the recent announcement of a new television insights study based on Comcast Spotlight’s footprint, she has more than enough data to discern both national and local market trends.  

But in a media market that offers a choice of many television performance reports, why release another one now? “When we first unlocked our set top box data, we saw that it was uncovering new insights which we publicized internally,” she explained. “We shared the results with our clients. Now we want to release the results to a wider audience.” Indeed, the insights gleaned from the set top box data dispels many myths regarding consumer preferences and gives greater clarity to both advertisers and programmers on viewer behaviors.

The Data

The report culls insights from over 17 million Comcast households across 65 markets. This is, “based on approximately nine billion hours of viewing data captured in Q1 2019. To put that number in perspective, it would take over 100,000 years to watch one billion hours of content,” she noted.  All of this data is managed by an analytics team. “We have data scientists and people who are used to working with big data and they cultivated it for us.”

For Coghill, time spent per day was an important metric. “The press reports that TV is dying, but in fact people are spending a lot of time with TV daily – over 6 hours – and it was up year to year.” The data shows that “TV is as strong as ever.”

A New Television Landscape

However, “TV viewing has changed,” she stated. “It’s not just about watching the four broadcast networks in primetime anymore. We found that 68% of time spent with linear TV is spent outside of primetime. The sheer number of networks that households are watching total over 34 per month. And the networks vary by household with cable accounting for 65% of all viewing.” The amount of networks viewed per month surprised both Coghill and me and is higher than other analyses based on much smaller samples. “If you just took the most watched network across all of our households, it is 308 different networks,” she added, which means that, “it’s getting harder and harder for advertisers to reach audiences at scale.” For Coghill, all of this speaks to the degree of fragmentation, “which we knew to be true but I was surprised as to how much fragmentation there actually is.”

The report found that primetime is not necessarily the highest viewing daypart, Sunday is not necessarily the highest viewing day of the week and the share of live and time-shifted viewing remained constant throughout the week. These insights hold great implications for programmers, schedulers, marketers and advertisers.

According to the report results, there was a significant uptick in viewing 1Q18 to 1Q19 with viewing on cable networks and Video on Demand (VOD) driving a large part of this growth. Notably, VOD viewership in Comcast homes doubled since 2016. 

Local Market Insights

“The data becomes especially valuable when you look at the local market level, especially when you get into niche audience segments,” because of the ample sample size that the Comcast data offers. “We can look at tens of thousands of households in many markets,” she stated. I found that there were fairly consistent viewing patterns across markets. Examples: The number of networks watched on a market-by-market level ranged from 30-37 and the amount of time viewing outside of prime ranged from 66% to 70%.

In comparing year to year trends, Coghill explained that, “While the big picture trends remain consistent across markets, there are definitely some nuances – households in Pittsburgh spend 6 hours 27 minutes with live linear television daily, while households in Salt Lake City spend 4 hours 41 minutes with live linear television daily. Households in Sacramento spend 1 hour 8 minutes with time-shifted viewing daily (DVR/VOD), while households in Miami only spend 35 minutes a day. When we get into the network level viewing, these differences become even more apparent.”

Stay Tuned

With all of this available data, there will be added analyses in future reports. “We are going to take a deeper look at viewing by market and by audience segments in an upcoming edition,” Coghill shared, “and these reports will come out quarterly going forward.”

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com