Introduction
Having been in the hot seat for a few months, I feel on top of things enough to report back and outline my plans for the rest of the year. I’m going to need a little help to achieve my goals, so do take the time to read what follows and share with those that need it.
Who should read this
A specific request is to ensure that this email gets to your technical team leads or 3rd-party development houses. They have to play ball and get educated so we’re all on the same page. I would recommend that the business execs receive this as well. Our industry’s ability to understand and communicate measurement data is a pillar upon which all our businesses now depend.
Portfolio Updates
OPA / Nielsen relationship
It’s robust and dynamic. I believe we’re pushing them harder than ever to ensure good service levels and are keeping them on their toes. I also feel there is both energy and willingness on their side to take everything up a gear as the membership grows and we are working as a team to that end. I would ask that you engage with them on careza@nielsen.com if you have queries, and to let me know through Theresa if they do not respond adequately. Further, if you feel they are doing a good job, I’d like to know about that too!
OPA / I-COM relationship
I’ve interacted quite a bit with the International Conference for Online Media Measurement (I-COM) since I came on board and they’ve been very helpful with advice and contacts around the world. We have also formalized by becoming an official country partner to the forum, which I hope will allow is to both learn and contribute at a global level. (www.i-com.org for more)
SiteCensus vs Market Intelligence
Although it was covered in the recent breakfast sessions, I feel many are still unclear on what the differences are…Essentially:
- SiteCensus is pure analytics, comparable to Google Analytics. It is primarily for your own internal use; if you want to see how one section of your site performs against others, this is where you would set this up.
- Market Intelligence is a media planning tool. It allows us and advertisers to see the rankings, compare trends to competitor sites and view survey-based demographic data.
- Market Intelligence data is critical to us all, and deserves your regular attention.
- More Reading: A comparison document from Nielsen’s on the subject.
Google Analytics vs Nielsen Online Member Survey
Oh gosh…
No matter who I’ve spoken to, the inconsistent variances in statistics between these two solutions is a major frustration for publishers. Generally though, we tend to think Google is wrapped in gold and can do no wrong, and Nielsen is the lesser cousin – the main reason? Nielsen figures are always lower, and we want to be big!
I’ve been doing tons of research into this and run some tests. I have some interesting findings so far but require more sample data before I can confidently release the findings with recommendations for our industry. So, I’m running a survey! And I need everyone to participate!
It is vital that every publisher submit data for as many of their sites as possible to give me a broad sample set. You will need to run a few reports on both Nielsens and Google Analytics for each site you own and then fill in the online form.
The online form will be online within the next few days. In the mean time, please use the attached PDF and prepare your data for submission. You will probably need the input of a few people to complete all the questions. An email with links to the survey will follow.
Submission Deadline: 15 August 2009
Metrics: Introduction of “Average Daily UB’s”
From 1 August you will see a new metric within MarketIntelligence called “Average Daily Unique Browsers”. Increasingly, this metric and not the monthly UB figure is being used in ranking systems internationally. The key reason is that the shorter the period of analysis, the better we handle the problem of cookie deletion. In essence, an average daily figure is as close an approximation of real people accessing a website that we can get to.
It is likely that from October we will be releasing the rankings based on this metric in line with our global peers. Please ensure you look at this metric in your reports for August, and any comments can be sent through to me via Theresa.
Rankings: Re-categorisation
It is wonderful to see how the membership has grown. That said, the current categories need some additions and refinement. As this is quite a hot potato, it will not be opened up for debate within the membership. Colin Daniels (OPA Head of Research) has compiled a draft set of new categories which is waiting for exco approval, and we’ll let you know once it’s in place so you can re-categorise your sites and brands if required.
Rankings: Clean-up
Nielsen has been working to clean up the rankings and the confusing listings and duplicates that seem to exist. I’d like to give each publisher the opportunity to look through each ranking (publisher, brand, site levels) and sort out your issues with Nielsen directly if you appear more than once or in a way that may be confusing to advertisers.
If you are confused about your “brands” vs “sites”, please contact Nielsen support and they will help you make the necessary changes. As a guide, a site is a single website (include sub-domains) and a brand is a collection of sites (url’s) that make up a one of your publishing titles.
I’m going to take this on with gusto after I’ve completed the Google/Nielsen survey and I’m going to be pretty firm with those that that haven’t put in any effort to resolve it themselves. It’s an integrity issue, and we need to reflect data that easily makes sense to anyone who sees it – particularly the growing set of advertisers that are accessing the data.
Demographics Survey Questions: 2009 Update
There is a drive from members and Nielsen’s to ensure we update both the form and delivery of the demographics survey. This is the survey that pops up on all our sites from time to time so we can get a sense of who our visitors are.
The first step is to update the questions we ask to be more relevant. We’ve received a few suggestions from members, and we want to open it up to everyone. It’s very easy:
- Visit the blog, and see the current survey questions document.
- View the current surveys running in other territories for inspiration. (Also on the blog!)
- Comment on the blog post with your ideas / suggested questions.
- We will consider your suggestions and current international best practices in other markets and revise the questionnaire.
The second step is to get better response rates. I’m not going to get into the specifics now, but the pop-ups approach doesn’t seem to be very effective. We all want more people to respond to give advertisers better demographic data. There are some alternative ways we can launch/host the surveys on our sites, and I’ll be working with Nielsens on the best ways for us to proceed on this technically.
Deadline: Please comment / add questions by August 15th
Where: http://blog.opa.org.za/2009/07/15/nielsen-mi-survey-questionsrespon/
Your To Do list
- Start collecting data on each of your sites for the Google Analytics vs Nielsen Survey as per the attached PDF.
- Submit suggestions of demographics questions to the blog.
- Look at your rankings and put some effort into to cleaning it up.
- Check the new Average Daily Unique Browser metric in MarketIntelligence from 1 August.
Feedback
If anyone has comments on this newsletter or suggestions for the measurement portfolio, please email them to Theresa. I know I’m asking for quite a lot, and would really appreciate your energy and assistance.
Thank you for your attention…!
Josh Adler
OPA, Head of Measurement
CEO, Prefix / pMailer (www.prefix.co.za / www.pmailer.co.za)
Connect on LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/joshadler
Josh,
I appreciate the need for Google vs Nielsen research but my biggest caution is to do with Domestic vs Total.
As far as I am concerned Domestic traffic is a key metric for monitoring a business as well as selling advertising.
Google is bad at this. Which is a key strength of Nielsen for me.
Please make sure to treat this with caution.
Many publishers prefer to talk about total traffic when in fact for most advertisers only the smaller domestic audience is relevant. Often this is misleading to the point of unethical in my opnion.
Kind regards,
Elan Lohmann
GM AVUSA Media Digital
Thanks Elan.
You raise an important point around domestic vs total traffic and what people promote. That’s more a code-of-conduct/member-behavior issue than a pure measurement issue, which is my focus. You’ll note that in the survey we ask for the % South African visitors, from which we can infer other domestic metrics.
The intent of the survey is not to compare Nielsen and Google - I’ve stated publicly in recent presentations that this is both wrong and unfair to do. What I’m trying to uncover is a set of best practices in the way we’re all approaching our tagging and analysis. In this way, we increase awareness of why things may be divergent and what can be done to ensure trend consitency between analytics tools if that is a goal for a publisher.
I indeed am treating this with caution. I hope the final report and analysis will reflect this.
Thanks for reading and adding your views. Much appreciated!
Josh
CEO, Prefix
Head of Measurement, OPA