Ian Dowds, UKOM CEO, and Liz Landy, Ipsos Connect UK CEO
Following a year-long consultation and tender, UKOM – the body which sets and governs the standard for UK online audience measurement – has appointed Ipsos as its new research supplier.
UKOM currently endorses Comscore’s online audience measurement products, which will remain the UK industry standard through 31 December 2020. Ipsos will take over the contract from January 1 2021.
The switch will introduce a number of changes for UKOM endorsed data, perhaps most notably the use of Ipsos’ new single-source, multi-device research panel, which is built around mobile and is 10,000 large.
It is an approach that will provide the flexibility to be fused with other media industry audience data sets, and when the project goes live will be dubbed ‘Iris’.
For the first time, the data will also cover day of week and time of day over a broader range of audience segmentation, “beyond simple demographics”, and a new capability to measure the audience of ad campaigns delivered online will be introduced.
UKOM data will also recognise the primacy of mobile devices for accessing internet content, and in the future the body will look to endorse measurement for online audiences on smart TVs and streamed online audio in addition to the current measurement of online audiences to websites and apps.
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According to UKOM, future TV and radio cross media measurement could be facilitated by Ipsos MediaCell passive meter technology.
“We recognise a growing desire from publishers, agencies and marketers for a more joined-up view of online audiences in the UK,” said Ian Dowds, UKOM CEO.
“What set the Ipsos approach apart was its single-source approach to building, via rigorous Establishment Survey, a high-quality panel of 10,000 consumers willing to participate in research and install meters on multiple devices. Ipsos’s methodology measures the individual consumer, not separate devices or browsers, making the data straightforward and transparent.”
Ipsos already provides advanced market research expertise across the media industry, and is behind the survey methodology used on PAMCo, RAJAR, Route, IPA TouchPoints and BARB.
Commenting on the news, Dominic Carter, group chief commercial officer at Sun and Times publisher News UK, said: “With the UK on track to be the first market in the world to exceed 70% of total spend via digital media, Ipsos’s appointment is a positive step forwards towards measurement of this tremendously complex area.”
The new contract is set to last five-years, and will require a new UK-based team of around 30 people to run.
