Moving Towards A Planning Currency For Online

Following on from MediaTel Group’s recent ‘Future of Media Research’ seminar, Peter Bowman, the recently appointed manager of the Joint Industry Committee for Internet Measurement Systems (JICIMS), looks at the body’s progress and explains why a planning currency for the internet is the next step forward…

“A single online planning currency,” it said in a NewsLine report following the successful seminar, “is absolutely necessary” (see Single Planning Currency For The Internet Is ‘Absolutely Necessary’). Constructing a ‘JIC’ for an apparently rampantly successful medium, a decade into its revenue and research rich life span, is not an easy task, or even, some would have it, a necessary one. So these words are encouraging, especially when the source was Louise Ainsworth, MD of Nielsen//NetRatings, one of the foremost current data suppliers.

JICIMS has been alive as a limited company, comparable in structure and intent to its more mature cousins like BARB and the National Readership Survey, rather than as an aspiration and a talking shop, since May 1. I think that it has been greeted with enormous goodwill. Can I give you any evidence that the fledgling JIC deserves the enthusiasm it has encouraged?

I want to consider JICIMS from two perspectives – firstly as the latest in a lengthy tradition of such bodies, and secondly in terms of what it could do to enhance online media planning and strategy.

Since I began my involvement with JICIMS, three impressions are paramount.

The first is that, however much the media business and peoples’ media consumption have changed, industry research systems retain their salience. By and large, the buying side especially, still welcome the transparency and efficiency combined with quality and cost control that JICs at least aspire to.

Others, who may well not be at all convinced by that traditional argument, or even particularly welcome a planning currency, concede that the necessary grappling with the pros and cons of such a currency is best conducted in the joint industry environment.

So, I congratulate the current four JICIMS shareholders – the IPA, ISBA, the IAB and the AOP – for their commitment, and it may be a very old media sentiment, but it’s a bit of an achievement to set up a 16-person steering group with more than half the members drawn from the front line of the new media taskforce.

The second impression is that there is a need, even in a novel, accountable and measurable medium like the internet, for what Andy Jonesco when he was at AOP called a ‘stake in the ground’. One of the major user requirements at this stage is for a basic tool which allows comparability at the planning stage with other main media. Some refer to a need to know the offline exposure patterns of online respondents. Most refer to the need for a (so far not possible) ‘plug in’ to TouchPoints.

Thirdly, more than for traditional JICs, there is the need to make a business case for JICIMS. All JICs are about increasing revenue, and really it is JICIMS only raison d’etre. We all know online revenue is booming, but maybe not so fast for branded and fmcg campaigns. As someone once said ‘online usually starts out on every campaign plan, but it falls off at the first stage due to the inability to compare effectively with and plan alongside other media.’

But what has JICIMS actually done and what does it intend to do?

The universe estimates used in any planning currency will derive from JICIMS own projections. To this end, JICIMS has been funding an expansion of the internet questions within the NRS face to face interviews. The first six months data, for July-December 2006, was released earlier in the spring. These are part of the ongoing NRS, so I urge all who are NRS subscribers (which includes most agencies) to have a look, via your software bureau in the orthodox fashion.

The questions cover the numbers and profiles of adults by their recency and frequency of use of the internet, location of use, the type and number of devices used, broadband take up, work Vs leisure use and shopping – all interlaced with the full range of NRS demographics.

It is JICIMS aspiration that the population survey is seen as definitive. This claim will only be met when discrepancies with data from Nielsen, comScore and TGI are fully explained, questionnaires are standardised (where feasible) and possibly third party data weighted to JICIMS. We are working with all three suppliers in this area – the issues are extremely complex – but we can expect progress later on this year.

One of JICIMS’ longer term aims is to make internet planning data more flexibly and widely available, and to allow non NRS subscribers and those without bureau facilities easy access – in the spirit of which, look out for www.jicims.org.uk.

At the core of the project will be a measurement system, providing information on different sites and estimates of ‘reach and frequency’ for campaigns using a range of sites.

JICIMS’ objective is indeed to create a planning currency, rather than a buying currency. JICIMS will be based on a user centric approach, probably based on a panel not unlike those operated currently by Nielsen//NetRatings, comScore or Intomart.

Such an approach differentiates JICIMS from the more prevalent site centric approach which is the cornerstone, for instance, of ABCe’s measurement. (Incidentally, the two bodies are in close and supportive touch with each other.) The Steering Group is currently considering all options prior to writing a specification, but the resulting tool is likely to cover a wide range of locations (especially home Vs work), a range of devices (including portable access), and will adopt a UK centric approach.

Although the mechanics vary across media, JICIMS is tackling issues familiar to other joint industry bodies. How comprehensive would be the range of sites included, with perhaps a minimum of say, 100,000 weekly users? Are we dealing with ‘page views’ or advertisements (a gross simplification of a complex issue)? What would be a realistic sample size?

‘Standard’ site usage will be obvious, but JICIMS will need to tackle a multiplicity of web usages – video streaming, for instance, or other devices connected to a PC into which ads can be served like games machines.

We can expect to see audience classifications ranging all the way from the traditional (but still salient) social grade to new usage based measures ‘beyond demographics’.

There is, it seems, agreement on one aspect. In a research rich environment, to really become ‘absolutely necessary’, a JICIMS planning currency would have to bestow ‘added value’ over and above that which is currently available. Perhaps we will be returning to discuss JICIMS’ success in that area in a few months time.