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Tag: comScore

  • GroupM names Brian Lesser as CEO, North America

    GroupM names Brian Lesser as CEO, North America

    MUMBAI: WPP’s GroupM has appointed Brian Lesser as CEO for business in the US and Canada.

     

    Lesser was previously Xaxis global CEO. He succeeds Kelly Clark, who will be transitioning to a new advisory role focused on strategic initiatives with clients and specialty businesses over the coming months.

     

    With this, Brian Gleason will succeed Lesser as Xaxis global CEO.

     

    In concert with these changes, GroupM global chief digital officer Rob Norman adds the position of chairman, North America to his responsibilities.

     

    The new roles for the two executives reflect GroupM’s certainty that the future of media-driven marketing is inextricably tied to data and technology. Key investments and partnerships over the past several years that support this positioning include WPP’s investments in comScore and AppNexus; GroupM’s and Kantar Media’s partnership with Rentrak; more recent alliances with BuzzFeed and Networked Insights; introduction of the industry’s first data management platform and first programmatic audience platform; introduction of Modi Media, the first fully-formed advanced TV specialty business delivering addressable TV ads at scale; and numerous progressive positions on digital ad viewability and measurement that are focused on raising the bar for effectiveness and trading currency.

     

    While driving advancement in North America, Lesser and Norman also each continue serving on GroupM’s global executive committee, led by GroupM global president Dominic Proctor and global chairman Irwin Gotlieb.

     

    “Brian will be a huge part of our future and his appointment reflects our values and ambition, as well as WPP’s drive to achieve 40-45% of revenues from digital in five years. Our future is being built on tech, data, talent and scale.  Brian absolutely gets that and is perfectly suited to help us shape that future to best serve advertisers.  We’re very fortunate to have him leading our business in the world’s biggest market,” said Proctor.

     

    “GroupM has continuously evolved with clients through major shifts in the media landscape and consumer behavior with data and technology having always been part of the value proposition. GroupM has challenged convention and forced dialogue on important issues to help clients be more successful. I’m humbled and grateful to have an opportunity to help continue this legacy at this time when complexity is more profound than ever,” added Lesser.

     

    “This is an exciting time for our company. We have many successes to count and new marketplace challenges to conquer, but above all, we have the strength of our agency brands, our specialist enterprises and our increasing differentiation in the management and application of data that leave us exceptionally well-positioned for the future. I’m energized by the road ahead and excited to work with Brian and our colleagues on the executive committee for the next chapter,” said Norman.

  • ComScore launches Mobile Metrix & mobile panel development with Kantar

    ComScore launches Mobile Metrix & mobile panel development with Kantar

    MUMBAI: comScore, Inc has launched two initiatives to expand mobile audience measurement in Indonesia. The global media measurement and analytics company has launched its syndicated Mobile Metrix solution, and has also introduced a joint mobile panel development with Kantar, which will fuel mobile and cross-media audience measurement in the future.

     

    comScore and Kantar will share more details on these developments at the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) Forum Indonesia during a joint presentation on The Future of Mobile Measurement. 

     

    “Kantar and comScore recognise the importance of comprehensive mobile measurement as essential to fostering sustainable growth in the mobile advertising and media ecosystem. The joint building of mobile panels in Indonesia will enable both comScore and Kantar to bring services to market faster, and is an important step forward for the future development of cross-media audience and campaign measurement,” said Kantar chief client officer, Asia Pacific Tim Kelsall.

     

    “The industry needs insights they can act on now as well as the assurance that measurement leaders are planning ahead to address their future needs in this fast-evolving space. Today, we announced initiatives to support both of these needs,” said comScore vice president, Southeast Asia Kerry J Brown.

     

    “Starting today, agencies, advertisers and publishers can leverage comScore Mobile Metrix to better inform media buying and selling strategies. As we look to the future, our work with Kantar to jointly build mobile panels will further advance mobile, multi-platform and cross-media measurement to benefit the entire industry. We are excited to announce these developments and look forward to sharing more updates as these solutions progress,” Brown added.

     

    The introduction of comScore’s census-based Mobile Metrix, now available in Indonesia, allows for reporting of mobile browser and app audiences on smartphones and tablets for tagged publishers.

     

    This service helps publishers to demonstrate the size and value of their mobile audiences to advertisers, and helps media planners and buyers to better evaluate advertising opportunities on mobile devices. In Asia Pacific, Mobile Metrix is available in 12 markets in addition to Indonesia.

  • Brands’ website traffic has direct correlation with TV advertising: study

    Brands’ website traffic has direct correlation with TV advertising: study

    NEW DELHI: A study shows that website traffic rises and falls in direct correlation with TV advertising for majority of call-to-action brands, which depend on immediate results from marketing efforts. 

     
    The Video Advertising Bureau’s (VAB) study Ignition Point: The TV-Traffic Correlation for Call-to-Action Brands came to this finding after studying 125 brands in six categories (restaurants, retail, travel, telecommunications & location-based mobile apps, financial and insurance) representing more than $30 billion in TV advertising in 2014.
     

    The brands studied were a cross-section – large, midsized, smaller, national, regional and local – with more than 100,000 unique visitors per month as measured by comScore. All results are from the February 2014 to March 2015 period. 

     
    A total of 82 per cent of these brands showed a direct correlation between TV advertising and website traffic. Of the 85 brands with unique visitor increases, 87 per cent had increased TV spending – an average of 22 per cent increase in spending and 24 per cent increase in visitors. Of the 40 brands with unique visitor decreases, 70 per cent had lowered TV spending – an average of 10 per cent less TV spending and nine per cent decrease in visitors.
     

    VAB CEO Sean Cunningham said, “TV is the great activator in Internet commerce. A majority of brands with the most on the line for big sales now see their website traffic follow the curve of their investment in TV advertising. TV advertising does more than generate awareness; it triggers the most important action at a time when the Internet functions as a brand’s storefront to the world.”

     
    While the specific ratios of advertising to traffic vary, the pattern is predominant and consistent. On a category level, 72 per cent of travel brands showed a direct correlation between TV advertising and website traffic, versus 76 per cent of restaurants, 82 per cent of retail, 85 per cent of insurance, 86 per cent of financial, and 100 per cent of telco/apps.
     

    This is the second report in the VAB’s commitment to illustrate critical effects of TV advertising that are hidden by the silo nature of syndicated data. Last year, it looked at the correlation between TV advertising and website traffic for 75 pure-play Internet companies, and found 85 per cent showed a direct correlation between TV spending and website traffic.

  • Kantar Media & comScore join hands to offer cross-media audience measurement

    Kantar Media & comScore join hands to offer cross-media audience measurement

    MUMBAI: comScore and Kantar Media will be introducing their first joint offering for cross-media audience measurement to key clients.

     

    The announcement was unveiled at a joint industry roundtable in San Sebastian, home to the 2015 I-COM Summit. This is the first outcome of the Kantar and comScore strategic alliance announced earlier this year to provide world class cross-media audience and campaign measurement capabilities to markets around the world.

     

    Bringing together the leading experts on TV and internet audience measurement, both companies have defined a roadmap together that addresses a range of reporting scopes and the options of available measurement assets and techniques, including panels, meters, tagging, home routers, return path data and census profiles.

     

    There has been significant interest in the partnership from clients and industry committees around the world. Based on this feedback, Spain has been identified as the pilot market with initial findings expected later this year, and other markets to follow.

     

    “As advertising spend on integrated cross-media campaigns increases, there is a growing demand for solutions that bring together TV and internet audience measurement to provide cross-media reach & frequency. We are pleased at the progress our research and technical teams have made in combining different measurement techniques and designing a common approach. Cross-media measurement solutions must be responsive to local needs so we have designed a framework that maximizes the use of existing data sets and commercial considerations in any given market,” said Kantar Media CEO & chairman Andy Brown.

     

    comScore CEO Serge Matta added, “We are delivering on our promise to simplify the deployment of global measurement capabilities and accelerate the creation of new services for the industry. The customer response to our partnership was extremely positive, as the market is eager to see cross-media measurement for both audiences and campaigns.”

     

    The defined scopes of reporting for an integrated measurement approach in addition to core broadcast TV include:

     

    * Extended TV – content broadcast in simulcast or on-demand on smartphones, tablets desktops and OTT devices.

     

    * Total Video – all video content from online platforms whether broadcast video or not, such as YouTube.

     

    * Total View – all online content whether video or text based, accessed via a browser or app, on smartphones, tablets desktops and OTT devices.

     

    Total View brings together gold-standard TV measurement and multi-platform online measurement for a complete view of viewers’ media usage on TV and online.

     

    In response to the needs of broadcasters, content owners and publishers to reduce the operational overhead of measurement, comScore and Kantar Media have developed an integrated tagging approach for web, video, and application measurement, allowing seamless data sharing with explicit client permission but without requiring duplication of implementations. Both companies will continue to support any tagging deployments under existing contracts. The option to move to an integrated approach would be a decision for the relevant joint industry committee or user group.

  • comScore rolls out programmatic trust initiative in 44 countries

    comScore rolls out programmatic trust initiative in 44 countries

    MUMBAI: Media sellers around the globe will now have the ability to showcase the true quality of their advertising inventory available for sale in programmatic environments through the use of comScore’s trusted, independent metrics.

     

    This is the first stage of the global rollout of the comScore Industry Trust Initiative, which brings an independent measure of quality to the programmatic trading world. The initiative was first introduced in the US in January 2015.

     

    As of 1 April, comScore publisher clients have access to their Trust Profiles – a collection of comScore key advertising metrics – which give each client insight as to how their inventory will soon be represented in programmatic trading platforms.

     

    comScore Trust Profiles include key advertising metrics such as audience and category ranking data, viewability ratings and non-human traffic (NHT) ratings, all of which are consistent with the metrics available in comScore MMX and validated Campaign Essentials (vCE) that advertisers and publishers use for traditional ad buys.

     

    Trust Profiles are now available with MMX metrics in 44 markets, with additional in-depth vCE metrics available in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S.

     

    “The growth of programmatic around the world no longer needs to be accompanied by a concern about the quality of inventory that’s being bought and sold. Expanding comScore Industry Trust – and specifically Trust Profiles – globally to media sellers is another step forward in elevating high quality inventory and ensuring that sellers receive fair value for those impressions. comScore Industry Trust ultimately offers a proactive way to create a trusted marketplace that better serves the needs of both buyers and sellers,” said comScore CEO Serge Matta.

     

    Trust Profiles will also be available in select DSPs in key international markets later in 2015. Integration partners include Adform, DataXu, Eyereturn Marketing, MediaMath, Turn, The Trade Desk and Rubicon Project. Additional partners will be announced throughout the year.

     

    Support for comScore’sefforts to enable trusted transactions of advertising:

     

    “As we continue to deliver more relevant and connected human experiences for our clients, we are aware that there is a continued need for technology to allow us to be more precise in our ability to target audiences in safe environments. The comScore Industry Trust Initiative allows us to deliver these experiences in brand-relevant and safe areas at scale,” said Starcom Media Vest Group Australia executive director – technology, digital and content Jason Tonelli.

     

    DataXu VP corporate and business development David Shapiro added, “At DataXu, we pride ourselves on giving our clients complete visibility into the data they’re using to make advertising decisions, and total control to manage those sources appropriately. comScore Industry Trust will provide a welcomed layer of independent validation, giving our clients and the broader industry greater confidence in the impressions that are being bought and sold programmatically.”

     

    Rocket Fuel VP product and operations Europe David Nelson said, “It is important that the lack of trust and clarity of supply within programmatic is addressed. We welcome comScore’s Industry Trust Initiative as a great move towards highlighting quality in programmatic, by providing a level of transparency in the pre-bid environment that has been so lacking to date.”

  • WPP’s Kantar inks global alliance outside US with ComScore

    WPP’s Kantar inks global alliance outside US with ComScore

    MUMBAI: ComScore has inked a strategic alliance with WPP’s data investment management division, Kantar.

     

    The alliance, which covers territories outside the US, establishes a framework for the parties to bring the best of breed together from the two companies – their products, technology, data assets, research panels and relationships – to provide world class cross-media audience and campaign measurement capabilities.

     

    The alliance follows the intended acquisition by WPP, announced earlier today, of a substantial equity stake in comScore. Under the terms of the agreement, comScore will issue 4.45 per cent in shares in exchange for the benefits of the strategic alliance, and acquisition of certain European Internet audience measurement assets. WPP will also purchase up to 15 per cent shares of comScore through a tender offer with an offering price of $46.13, giving WPP a total ownership stake in comScore of between 15-20 per cent. The transaction is subject to customary regulatory approvals and is expected to close in the second quarter of 2015. Provided WPP’s tender offer is successful, it is expected to be accretive to comScore’s non-GAAP earnings per share in 2015.

     

    comScore will partner with Kantar and its operating businesses on cross-media audience and campaign measurement in non-US markets. comScore will also acquire the assets of Kantar’s Internet audience measurement businesses in certain European markets. In these markets, Kantar and comScore will continue to provide the same level of seamless integration and data services.

     

    “This long-term, strategic alliance will simplify the deployment of global measurement capabilities and accelerate the creation of new services for the industry. The emerging mediascape points to a massive global opportunity waiting to be unlocked by cracking the code on cross-media audience and campaign measurement. We look forward to working together with Kantar to deliver new measurement products based on our complementary offerings in these markets,” said comScore CEO Serge Matta.

     

    Kantar CEO Eric Salama added, “By partnering with comScore and combining our respective strengths, we will integrate data and expertise to give our clients a new standard in measuring audiences and campaigns across multiple platforms. This continues our strategy of combining survey, panel and census data and putting digital at the heart of all we do.”

  • Starsports.com to show ICC WC 2015 in four languages

    Starsports.com to show ICC WC 2015 in four languages

    MUMBAI: As the year comes to an end, cricket fans are eagerly awaiting for 2015 to begin. Cricket mania is set to take over as ICC Cricket World Cup will begin in February next year. And waiting to cash in on the opportunity is starsports.com.

     

    According to Star India EVP and new media head Ajit Mohan, the portal will be following a three step strategy ahead of the mega event. “Firstly, we will create an immersive experience by launching a video timeline that will be available to all fans of starsports.com fans. It will allow them to catch up very quickly on a match, when they come to witness the action on the website. We were the first to introduce the video timeline and we will now take it to every fan,” he says.

     

    “Secondly, we will provide the option for users to switch between languages. Currently we are looking at four languages; Hindi, English and two regional languages,” he adds.

     

    “Thirdly, we are going to have a lot more data and analytics on our site. Apart from this, there will be original stories written by a stellar list of writers like Harsha Bhogle,” he informs.

     

    The website currently is in a celebratory mood. According to data, recently released by comScore, the portal which was launched in June 2013 has beaten the dominant 20 year-old market leader ESPNcricinfo, by a slender margin. For the month of October, the website garnered 4.242 million traffic versus 4.233 million of ESPNcricinfo.

     

    The data also suggests that sports viewership in India is going through a rapid change due to a shift in viewership patterns. Consumers are moving away from basic text and scorecards to a more immersive sports experience on digital. The explosion in the sale of smart phones and increase in access to 3G and broadband explains this trend, says the study.

     

    When questioned what have been the ingredients that have helped starsports.com achieve this recent feat, Mohan explains that the portal has always focused on three areas – enhancing video experience, engaging data and analytics and lastly, storytelling.

     

    “We want to create a video experience that surpasses all constraints of data access and works even at low bandwidths,” says Mohan while adding that sports fans are avid consumers of statistical data too.

     

    Mohan credits his digital team for the website’s way forward. “The DNA of this company is that we are story tellers. We turn data and analytics into sports telling, in a way that can’t be done on television.  For example, we have short clips of matches that are curated to tell a story,” concludes Mohan.

  • Vdopia announces APAC launch of Chocolate

    Vdopia announces APAC launch of Chocolate

    MUMBAI: Vdopia, the global leader in mobile and online video advertising has announced Asia-Pacific (APAC) launch of programmatic buying and selling platform exclusively for mobile video advertising.

    The new marketplace product called, Chocolate, is built from the ground up solely for mobile video advertising. It is designed for brand marketers and demand partners who want a highly functional marketplace platform that offers top quality mobile video inventory at significant scale with complete transparency. Chocolate is being launched with a potential audience reach of more than 200 million unique users globally.

    “Vdopia has constantly delivered excellent video ad campaigns for top brands in APAC. With more than 10,000+ mobile sites and apps globally, we are excited to support brands and publishers to deliver amazing ad experience in a more efficient manner,” said  Vdopia CEO Saurabh Bhatia and added, “With Chocolate, we’re providing an automated, scalable solution for advertisers to further take control of their campaigns; advertise on mobile with a high ROI; and generate more loyal customers. Chocolate is positioned to capitalize on macro trends including moves into programmatic and the emergence of mobile native advertising.”

    The Chocolate platform is device-agnostic and is compatible with all major operating systems. All ads served through Chocolate are vast compliant. The platform is integrated with leading demand partners, analytics providers such as Metamarkets and measurement partners including Nielsen (mobile OCR) and comScore vCE to provide a highly transparent, scalable and measurable advertising experience for brands and their agencies.

    “One of the unique advantages of Chocolate is its capability to provide real-time bidding to demand partners which have only basic VAST support but no RTB or Real Time Bidding capability,” said Vdopia CTO Srikanth Kakani.

    “The new marketplace unifies a fragmented mobile video market space and addresses growing mobile industry complexities including lack of standards, brand safety and a dearth of quality mobile video inventory” said Vdopia APAC senior VP Preetesh Chouhan. “Chocolate is the only marketplace that offers end to end functionality for scaling video ads on mobile and best monetisation opportunities for publishers”.

    Chocolate also allows leading brands to auto-play video ads on mobile web pages and apps, adjacent to content, on virtually any smartphone, without disrupting the user’s web-browsing experience. This keeps users on the page without annoying distractions and increases video reach and measurability. Chocolate takes advantage of Vdopia’s proprietary .VDO technology, which enables advertisers and publishers to seamlessly run video-enabled ads on the mobile web and apps using simple tags and SDKs.

     

  • Vdopia Inc. Ranks as No. 1 Video Ad Network by ComScore

    Vdopia Inc. Ranks as No. 1 Video Ad Network by ComScore

    MUMBAI: Vdopia Inc., the pioneer in mobile and online video advertising, became the first Ad Network in India and South East Asia to surpass 10 million Unique Viewers. ComScore’s Video Ad Metrix ranked Vdopia as the No.1 Ad Network in India for December 2013 with 10.65 million Unique Viewers.

    According to the latest analysis, Vdopia surpassed Yahoo and Times Internet properties in the online video rankings while closing ranks with Facebook with a marginal 12% difference in Unique Viewers.
     

    Preetesh Chouhan, VP, APAC, Vdopia says, “Vdopia numbers released by ComScore are very positive and reaching 10 million unique viewers is an important benchmark for us as an Ad network.  Vdopia always partners with premium content providers to deliver advertisers the right scale and reach for efficient and targeted campaigns.”

    This announcement follows Vdopia Inc.’s 100% global growth announcement, IMPACT’s ‘Digital Power 100’ ranking and a SMARTIES award, as it continues on a wave of global and regional recognition and growth.
     

    India’s consumption for online video has literally doubled with the adoption of devices, technology and content options. Vdopia will continue to strengthen its presence in the APAC region with a focus to make India the global operation hub.

  • Online video advertising is gaining popularity in US: comScore

    Online video advertising is gaining popularity in US: comScore

    MUMBAI: The comScore online video rankings have shown that while the number of content pieces watched online has dipped but online video advertising is getting popular.

    The monthly ranking of the online video market showed that 188.5 million Americans watched 46.7 billion online content videos which attracted 22.8 billion video ad views. This compared with 187 million viewers consuming more than 48 billion online content videos with 19.6 billion video ad views.

    As ever YouTube-driven Google sites dominated, boasting the highest average engagement among the top ten properties, taking 167 million unique viewers. The month’s big news in terms of properties though was AOL which captured the number two spot with 71.2 million views, up 57.9 million in July, displacing Facebook to third place with 62.2 million even though the social network added just under a million more viewers. Next was NDN with 50.7 million and VEVO with 49.4 million. August 2013 also saw 46.7 billion video content views with Google sites generating the highest number at 17.4 billion, followed by AOL with 992 million and Facebook with 803 million.

    All of this content activity was the driver for an increasingly robust online video where 87 per cent of the US internet audience viewed online video for which the duration of the average online video ad was 0.4 minutes with the average online content video rolling in at 5.2 minutes. Video ads accounted for a third of all videos viewed and 3.4 per cent of all minutes spent viewing video online.

    Google sites contributed 3.2 billion video ad impressions out of the total of 22.8 billion for the month. Adap.tv came in second with more than 2.4 billion ads, followed by BrightRoll Platform with 2.4 billion and LiveRail.com with 2.2 billion. Time spent watching video ads was 8.5 billion minutes, with BrightRoll Platform and Adap.tv delivering the highest duration of video ads at 1.1 billion minutes each. Video ads reached 56 per cent of the total US population an average of 132 times during the month. The recently enriched Hulu over-the-top (OTT) service delivered the highest frequency of video ads to its viewers with an average of 71.