NewsLine Column: Introducing Multi-Media Measurement
The IPA has today launched a wide-ranging research initiative providing the advertising industry with a single source media survey. Lynne Robinson, research director at the IPA, explains why a credible multi-media measurement system is needed to boost the perceived professionalism of the industry …
It seems that everyone, these days, is calling for multi-media measurement to address the needs of the ‘channel neutral planning’ present. This, of course, is easier said than done! It is unrealistic to think that the current single medium based industry currencies can be merged into one, since no methodology (currently available) can adequately measure them all. The financial structure of the industry currencies, in that they are primarily funded by the media owners also mitigates against this and the politics involved in bringing all the media owners together would be horrendous. However, despite these barriers, the industry does need a multi-media planning tool, since the lack of one is not only a major practical problem but also impinges on the perceived professionalism of the media industry.
In response to this situation, the IPA has launched its TouchPoints project under the auspices of its Media Futures Group. The first stage in the project was to undertake qualitative work within its member agencies to see what tools they considered they needed and if any of those could be provided by the IPA – the answer which came back was the provision of a multi- media planning tool – thus TouchPoints was born.
The IPA TouchPoints Survey is a consumer centric multi-media hub survey. The project falls into two parts: the first is a survey of 5000 adults who will complete an extensive contact questionnaire covering a wide range of demographics, psychographics, lifestyle and shopping questions plus their usage and attitude to a wide range of communication channels ie. television, press radio, cinema, outdoor, the internet, sms, direct mail, event sponsorship etc.. After this, the respondent will be asked to complete a PDA based half hourly diary which will detail where they are, what they are doing, who they are with and what media they are consuming. These data will provide detailed time-based multi-media usage.
Following this, the second part of the TouchPoints project will be to fuse the industry currencies eg. BARB, NRS etc. onto the TouchPoints Hub Survey. This will ensure that the gold standard trading currencies are preserved and maintained between the planning and buying processes. It will also be possible for users to integrate other media surveys onto the Hub Survey to allow them to customise it for their own specific uses.
The TouchPoints project has created a great deal of interest. The IPA has joined forces with ten media owner, founding partners to drive this project forward, these are: AOL, BBC, Chrysalis, JCDecaux, Emap, Guardian Newspapers, ITV, News International, SMG and Wanadoo.
The methodology has just gone into pilot with NOP, the results of the pilot are expected in early September. The Hub Survey will take about four months to complete and this will be followed by the integrations. We are anticipating publishing the results of this ambitious project in late Spring 2005.
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