Media Researchers Give TouchPoints Warm Welcome

Speaking at last week’s MRG Question Time, held in association with MediaTel Group, the panel welcomed the IPA’s TouchPoints Research, looking forward to seeing how the initiative will affect the advertising industry.

The panel claimed that the IPA initiative will give a much needed consumer centric measurement system. Manfred Mareck, from Research Marketing Ltd, said the scheme is “moving away from the media centric and moving towards the more consumer centric measurement, which is what advertisers need.”

Mike Baker, European marketing director at Viacom Outdoor, also welcomed TouchPoints saying: “I think it is a very good initiative. Looking at how media is consumed and also the time of day is needed in the media now.”

David Fletcher, head of Medialab at Mediaedge: CIA, added: “I think the data will be a valuable complement to what we already have and I am looking forward to using it.”

Raising the actual affect the new survey will have on the advertising business, Sue Elms, managing director of Carat Insight asserted that TouchPoints would make advertisers think harder about their advertising campaigns.

She explained: “It challenges convention. You can’t add up apples and pears. We’re going to be looking at how many TV impressions, to print impressions, to internet – and this will raise some debate.

“It will also make us think harder about our multi-media campaigns” she added.

Slightly more doubtful of the overall affect TouchPoints will have on the advertising industr, was Nick North, managing director of GfK NOP Media, who said: “How much it will change the world I don’t know, also whether the client will stick to it, or one medium will benefit from it more remains to be seen.”

MRG: www.mrg.org.uk