Tablets, TouchPoints and news
Newsworks’ Matt Patchett explores what the latest IPA TouchPoints research can tell us about newsbrand tablet readers.
At the start of 2010, nobody gave tablets much thought. But then, just five months later, Apple launched the iPad and everything changed. Today, according to TouchPoints5, over 13.8 million people in the UK own a tablet, with more than a third of them saying that they literally could not live without one.
Okay, so I may have added the literally, but the point still stands: the rise of tablets has been phenomenal. For the media world, this has been as exciting as it has been frustrating, as the new opportunities that tablets have introduced have often been coupled with a lack of information or insight about the new platform.
But in the intervening years since Apple helped to ignite the tablet market, progress has certainly been made. In 2012 for example, TouchPoints released tablet data for the first time, while other data providers like comScore have begun to introduce new metrics for the device.
At Newsworks, we have conducted several studies into newsbrands on tablets, including our Tablet Project earlier this year, which established some key benchmarks for tablet advertising. But there’s always a demand for a deeper understanding of readers, so when the IPA invited us to hold a joint event looking at newsbrands on TouchPoints, we thought it was the perfect opportunity to take a closer look at this growing audience.
So, first things first, who are these people? Unsurprisingly, newsbrand tablet readers are wealthy: they’re twice as likely to have a household income above £55,000 than the average UK adult, and 22% more likely than the average tablet user.
They are also more likely to own the latest technology, consume a wide range of media and keep up to date with new fashions and trends. This means that tablet newsbrand readers are very influential individuals, who are 61% more likely than the average adult in the UK to be conversation catalysts – the TouchPoints category for people who know more about products and brands and are more likely to offer advice about them.
For this tech-savvy group, apps are a popular method for accessing newsbrands on tablets, with 37% of readers saying they use an app to look at newsbrands at least once a day, while 59% say they do so at least once a week.
TouchPoints tells us that the average time that people spend reading newsbrands on tablets – on the days they read – is 45 minutes. This is approaching the depth of reading that newsbrands enjoy in print. But while newsbrands in print and on tablets may offer similar reading experiences, generally people are not having to choose between the two, as more than six out of 10 newsbrand tablet readers also read a print newspaper each week.
As well as delivering quantity of time, newsbrands also deliver quality. Not only are readers less likely to be distracted by other activities, they’re also less likely to be using other media. We hear a lot these days about multi-screening and with TouchPoints we can see that it is quite prevalent: 33% of the total time spent with tablets is spent in front of a TV set.
However, when we look specifically at newsbrands on tablets, this number falls to less than a quarter (24%), showing that readers are more focused than the average tablet user.
Perhaps it is because readers are generally more engaged when they are using their tablets, that TouchPoints shows that they are so relaxed – especially at weekends. This is particularly interesting for advertisers, as empirical evidence suggests that a more relaxed – or less time-pressured – mindset leads to higher attention to advertising.
Their relaxed frame of mind may not just be down to how respondents are reading on their tablets, but also when. At the weekend, when tablet readers are most relaxed, this may be because a significant number of people are accessing newsbrands early in the morning – before the stresses of the day begin – with half of reading taking place before 9.30am.
This also provides advertisers with an interesting opportunity, as it means that over half of reading is done before the vast majority of shopping (over 90%) takes places. This is in contrast to TV, where a large proportion of viewing (65%) occurs after most shopping has been completed (88%).
This is a good example of how newsbrands can work alongside TV, as it offers advertisers the chance to deliver a ‘double header’ at both ends of the day.