Brand Strategy Key Findings – May/June 2011
Online Video Usage Through TV
Some 24% of American households have connected their TV sets to the Internet through a gaming system, Blu-ray player or directly to the Internet itself, but only 5% of these households use those devices to watch video from the Internet in an average week. Those watching from these devices include 16% of men aged 18 to 24, compared to 3% of the rest of the population.
Usage of online pay-for-video services also remains relatively low. For example, only 4% of households use Netflix’s “Watch Instantly” services weekly. Only 5% would be willing to pay $9.95 to access Hulu’s full video library. And, just 4% would strongly consider disconnecting their TV in favor of online video services.
Baby Boomers Still Matter
Spending by America?s 116 million Baby Boomers age 50 and older was $2.9 trillion last year, up 45% over the past 10 years. Meanwhile, the 182 million people younger than age 50 spent $3.3 trillion last year, up only 6% during the same decade.
Despite the stereotype of older consumers shying away from new things, Boomers are among the biggest buyers of new technology and new cars. For example, consumers ages 50 and older spent $87 billion on cars during 2010 compared with $70 billion by those under age 50, per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Boomers are expected to get even more wealthier: Americans ages 50 and older will inherit an estimated $14 trillion to $20 trillion during the next 20 years.
Customer Service More Important During Recession
Some 61% of Americans say that customer service is more important to them during the recession than it was in prior years. They repay excellent service by spending an average of 9% more with those companies. Only 37% say that companies have taken notice of this change and improved their customer service. Some 28% say companies are actually paying less attention to the service they provide.
The greatest influences in consumers? choices of companies to do business with include personal experience (98%), the company’s reputation or brand (92%), and recommendations from friends and family (88%).
Email Use Dropping as Social Networking Picks Up
According to ComScore, email use dropped 59% among users aged 12-17, as well as 8% overall during 2010. Users between the ages of 18 and 54 are also sending/receiving email less, however, those 55 and older are actually using email more.
Instead of using email, young people in America are turning to social networks to communicate. Social networks account for 14% of time spent online in the U.S. Specifically, Facebook accounts for 10% of page views and it enjoyed a 38% growth of American users to reach 153.9 million in 2010. Total time spent on the site went up 79% to 49.4 billion minutes.
Facebook is only one piece of the American social networking scene. Nine out of every 10 online users visited social networking sites by the end of 2010. LinkedIn grew by 30% to 26.6 million users, while Twitter grew 18% to 23.6 million users, and Tumblr enjoyed 168% growth to 6.7 million users. However, MySpace saw a decrease of 26%, falling to 50 million users.
Computer Tablet Use
Most computer tablet users are finding it primarily a source of entertainment. Nearly seven in 10 tablet owners spend at least 1 hour per day using the device, including 38% who spend over two hours. While 28% consider it their primary computer, 77% report they are spending less time on their desktop or laptop PCs since they got a tablet.
Over 80% of tablet owners said they mostly use the device at home; just 11% use them primarily on the go.
Some 43% of tablet owners spend more time each day with their tablet than with a desktop or laptop computer. Other select media receiving less time due to tablet usage are detailed in the chart below.
U.S. Tablet Owners Who Spend More Time Each Day on Their Tablet Than with Select Media, March 2011 (% of respondents)
- 59% Paper book
- 52% Radio
- 43% Desktop/laptop
- 41% Smartphone
- 34% TV
- 11% None of the above
Source: AdMob
Emerging Majorities Response to Digital Advertising
Hispanics have a higher response rate to digital ads than Blacks or Whites. This includes banner ads and email promotions. Both Hispanics and Blacks are three times as likely as Whites to respond to pop-up ads.
Moms Want Email Promotional Messages
Women with children under the age of 12 (80%) say they look forward to checking their email, and 96% do so at least once per day. Some 80% want to receive email messages from their favorite brands, with 45% wanting these once a week. Seventy percent say they would provide information about their children if that allowed them to receive more tailored information and offers.
Moms are most interested in emails that include coupons (85%) and information about sales and promotions (73%). Some 78% say they would make special trip to a store after receiving a coupon via email; 63% have printed coupons for their next trip to the store for brands they use or would like to try.
Twitter Posts
The vast majority of messages posted on Twitter (91%) are from consumers, 8% are generated by companies or brands, and 1% are from celebrities.
Messages posted by consumers include mentioning brands (12%) and most commonly refer to social network brands (22%), entertainment brands (17%), and technology brands (17%). Messages about brands mostly share news or information about the brand (43%), refer to using the brand (35%), or share an opinion about the brand (21%).
Research shows that Twitter messages are most commonly conversational with 43% directed at a specific person, 24% are status updates or ritualistic, and 12% are news items. Some 92% of Twitter messages are viewable by the general public; only 8% are sent privately.
Bullets
- Some 34% of North Americans say they visit social networking sites because they receive an email to their personal address. In comparison, only 4% do so after getting an SMS text message, a direct mailing (2%), an email to their work account (2%), or a telephone call (1%).
- Almost one-half of adults (47%) have sent a text message while driving compared to 34% of teens aged 16-17.
- About 45% of people have blocked or defriended a person on a social network because of uncivil comments or behavior.