The focus of the online coverage currency used in the AGOF internet facts study lies in the definition for coverage of an advertising medium as applicable in media and advertising research.
This data is shown as a percentage of the population or other target group, whether it is persons or households who are/were exposed to this advertising medium at a certain point in time or within a certain period.
In the internet facts study, coverage is defined in terms of the so-called ‘Unique User’, meaning the individual user.
In order for the internet facts study to be established in the market as an accepted currency, it needs to meet several requirements. Seen from the perspective of media planning, these include providing coverage and audience composition data for all relevant web sites and their booking units and, in addition, data that can be counted using media planning tools, so that the data sensibly support the creation of media plans.
Necessary requirements from a methodological perspective are compliance with quality criteria of empirical social research such as validity, reliability and representativity of the results. Furthermore, technical measurements suitable for an electronic medium such as the Internet should be an important part of the methodology used, in order to reflect the fragmented media consumption.
Thus, the methodological basis for the internet facts study is a three-pillar model, where the electronic measurement of media consumption (basic data collection) stands at the centre, and is supplemented by on-site surveys as well as telephone interviews that gather results representative of the population.
Chart: Requirements for the Currency
The three base modules have the following functions: mere technical measurement, which provides for collecting data of almost the entire number of exposures achieved by German online advertising media and includes collecting data of learned parameters such as visits and page impressions. All of these measurements are based on each individual computer that is measured for Internet use. The computers are referred to as ‘Unique Clients’.
While the ‘Unique Client’ accounts for the universe of the technical measurement, the on-site survey serves as a means to generate information on the audience behind the computers. Here, the universe consists of the German Internet audience 14+ years old. Apart from sociodemographic parameters that describe persons, the on-site survey also collects data on the use of the computer.
In general, a currency is based on the universe defined as the German population 14+ years old. By implementing the representative telephone survey, the Internet audience is linked to the entire German population: here, basic data on use of the Internet is collected, and it will therefore be possible to show the proportion of the Internet audience to the entire population.
Only through the interplay of all three pillars in an innovative process can coverage and audience composition data for online advertising media be collected.
Chart: The Three-Pillar Model
The most important innovation of the Internet Facts study is the conversion from ‘Unique Clients’ to ‘Unique Users’, which are the audience behind the computers. ‘Unique Clients’ do not represent the actual individual. Although individual users (the computer is used by one person who does not use any other Internet access, and thus one ‘Unique Client’ equals one ‘Unique User’) form an essential part of the online audience, there are also other computers which are used by several users, the so-called ‘Multi Users’.
Moreover, there are computers which are only partially used by one user for accessing the Internet, because this person accesses the Internet by using several computers, for example at home or at work. These are known as ‘Multi Clients’.
Therefore, to convert ‘Unique Clients’ to ‘Unique Users’, in the first step, ‘Multi User’, ‘Multi Client’, and single user profiles have to be identified from the data of the first pillar.
Chart: Identifying and Differentiating Computer or Browser Profiles
IIn the second step the data collected through the technical measurement (SZM traffic statistics) have to be enriched with the additional data collected through the on-site surveys.
To do this, here, a combined dynamic profiling and modelling procedure to build so-called ‘dynamic microclusters’ is used: ideal types of audience profile are created from audience data that has been collected through both technical measurement and online surveys (profiling).
Chart: Enriching Profiles
Following this, by applying identity or similarity principles, the sociodemographic data of each ideal type of user is projected to the kind of audience for which only the actual Internet media consumption behaviour from the technical measurement is available, and which corresponds to the behaviour of one of the ideal types of audience.
In doing so, missing sociodemographic data will be supplemented and complete audience profiles will be generated (modelling). The conversion from ‘Unique Clients’ to Unique Users’ will then be complete.
Chart: Enriching Profiles
In order to apply the information collected so far to the German Internet audience of 14+ years old or to the entire population, a large-scale representative telephone survey is conducted.
DThe telephone survey serves to accomplish the followings tasks: first, to define and describe the universe of the German Internet audience; second, to collect data of the non-Internet audience; and third, to collect descriptive information, which is required to create target groups. Apart from extensive sociodemographic data this also includes data on markets and the industry as well as information about the respondents’ opinions. The countable bulk of data of the internet facts study is created by fusing technical measurement data with the data collected through the representative survey and its subsequent processing for using the data in planning tools.
The dynamic aspect of this approach lies in the quick and simple adaptation of the modelling to altered audience profiles which can result from the addition of new web sites, amendments to technical parameters, to the universe of the Internet audience, etc.
Chart: Interaction of the Three Pillars
For the very first time in the history of online media and advertising media research the innovative multi-method approach of the internet facts study allows for the publication of audience-specific data for booking units. Moreover, with the amalgamation of technical and survey data as well as the flexible adaptation to dynamic changes of the online market, the approach meets all the requirements of a hitherto absent market standard.
Chart: What does the study have to offer?
With the internet facts study wave 2005-II, in the autumn of 2005 AGOF published media data in the form of coverage and audience composition as well as market data for the first time. This combined data produced a market media study that displays the online advertising market at a hitherto undeveloped level of segmentation.
Furthermore, with the internet facts study wave 2005-II the AGOF also provided the first bulk of data to be available for online media planning.
