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A Thoroughly British Summer of Sport

After England’s capitulation at the Football World Cup and Andy Murray’s defeat at Wimbledon... you would have thought that the Great British public would have had enough of sport for a while!

However, this week saw the culmination of Wimbledon, the start of the Tour de France (in Yorkshire …), the continuation of the World Cup and the small matter of the British Grand Prix. With the weather being largely good how would TV audiences fare?

Well the answer has to be pretty well…. no one would have been more upset to see England out of the World Cup than ITV’s chief executive Adam Crozier. Well, he would have been very happy with Friday night’s Brazil v Colombia performance which pulled in an average audience of 8.7m, with a 42% share of viewing. The canny Scot may have allowed himself a wee chuckle when he saw the viewing figures, hopefully his bonus won’t be too badly affected!

BBC1’s showing of the Holland v Costa Rica match on Saturday night did not fare quite as well, though still averaged 8.2m, a 46.2% share. Of course, had England progressed then these figures would have been substantially higher. The England v Uruguay match peaked at over 20m viewers, with a huge 66.7% share of viewing. By the time of the Costa Rica game the audience had dwindled to an average of 7.8m (albeit with a 1700 kick off) with only 46.5% of TV viewers deciding to watch the final throes of the campaign.

Coverage of the “Grand Depart” was simulcast on ITV and ITV4 and pulled a combined audience across Saturday of almost 2m, with an average share of over 21% between 1030 & 1700. ITV in isolation delivered an average of over 1m viewers, up from 470,000 the previous week. The previous year’s coverage, with the race starting in Corsica, delivered an average audience of 164,000, 1.9% share (ITV4 only). Sunday’s coverage didn’t fare quite so well, possibly due to Mark Cavendish’s early exit, though more likely the competition that it faced. A combined audience of 1.7m viewed the coverage, 14.8% share. Again ITV have to be very happy with this performance.

So what of the competition? The Wimbledon Ladies final on BBC1 delivered an average audience of 2.1m, a 21.3% share. This is down substantially on the previous year’s final, 3.34m & 39% respectively. The coverage did clash with the qualifying for the Grand Prix, which ran on both BBC2 and Sky Sports F1. BBC2 clearly won this battle, with 1.67m viewers (17.9%) v Sky’s 305,000 (3.3%).

Of course 2013 saw a British winner at Wimbledon and so this year’s men’s final was never going to fare as well. Last year’s coverage drew an average audience of 12.1m to BBC1 (a 72.4% share), peaking at 17.8m. This year’s final delivered an average of 5.27m, a 35.9% share, peaking at 8.7m. This is very impressive considering that this year it was up against coverage of the British Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton’s effort to restore some pride to British sport was viewed by over 3.5m people on average, peaking at 4.9m. Almost 85% of this viewing was on BBC2.

There is no doubt that both Wimbledon & Le Tour affected audience delivery on the Formula One with the combined average being down by almost 20%.

Something for Bernie to ponder …....

- Steve

Wider Applications of Analytics and MMM

Big data, small data, everywhere new data... and tools are enabling the wider application of analytics to support business decisions. The role of analytics is increasing in the scope of decisions it can support, and also in the number of business able to adopt it. Market Mix Models (MMM) are an example of a powerful analysis we now apply far more widely than in the past.

Media stands to benefit from advances in analytics more than other business areas. In the past, a lack of relevant data and the challenges in usefully studying it have meant analytics could not easily be used to inform decisions. Consider post-media-campaign analysis. Most of the important questions decision makers are interested in aren’t possible to measure directly, for example: how many sales did my last TV campaign generate? The go-to solution for answering a question like this is MMM: market mix models. These are econometric models that seek to understand shifts in an outcome (typically sales) by mathematically accounting for all of the drivers known to impact that outcome, thus allowing an understanding of each driver’s relation to the outcome (e.g. TV in relation to sales).

MMM is a powerful analysis it can tell the advertiser, in some cases with good precision, what is working. MMM means advertising spending can be optimised, having a direct impact on profitability. However ‘accounting for all of the significant drivers’ means gathering data for those drivers and econometric processes to model it this has historically been a substantial barrier.

MMM studies are not new, they date to the 1960’s it is a ‘traditional’ place for analytics. However, studies had been limited to larger enterprises because the prerequisites were costly: data-infrastructure, analyst time, and software investments. Recently, more accessible data and tools now enable application of this kind of work quicker and across more businesses.

For data, although some silos and data key-holders still exist, most marketing departments are now able to regularly access to their company data; meanwhile Web analytics, data providers, and buzz monitoring provide additional access to rich data sources. New tools and applications like R programming language and specialist software have substantially reduced the time required to create this analysis.

AMS uses software by Marketing QED. Marketing QED is a tool made specifically for the production of MMM models. The implementation of the tool has meant a substantial reduction in study time after data gathering. The tool has helped in studies for clients in various stages of data maturity gain the benefit of MMM insight previously unobtainable.

Success in modelling sales in FMCG, travel, online loans, and retail has meant real changes to clients business. These clients have essentially benefited from being part of the early majority in adaptation: they get the insight from these studies without having had to develop in-house solutions like the larger early-adapting organisations did. These businesses might have rejected embarking on this kind of study in the past due to data barriers and cost but now find it hard to live without.

MMM is just one example of how applied econometrics; previously hard to implement but now viable to most advertisers, is providing a real competitive advantage to its adapters, as application grows those without it may soon find themselves at a disadvantage.

- William

More Data…………..

In a world of mass data it is critical that we have access to the latest insights to shape and define the UK consumer and particularly their changing media consumption. It has been an exciting past month with the launch of 2 eagerly awaited products - the latest IPA Touchpoints study now in its 5th wave and the new Experian MOSAIC classifications.

Touchpoints Study has given us the ability to understand when consumers are consuming which mediums and for how long, a vital tool in an ever changing media world. The emergence of screen-based technology has changed the way we live. In 2012 the average time a day spent on the internet was 1 hour and 56 minutes but in 2014 this is 2 hours and 27 minutes, with 32% of adults accessing the web via a smartphone. In the 2 years since the last Touchpoints study the percentage of your communication time on social networking has more than doubled from 5% in 2012 to 12%.

All interesting facts that just heighten our challenge of devising the optimum communication strategy but what we have been awaiting is the mobile passive data. So for the first time we will be able to actually see what people are doing on their smartphone rather than what they claim or can remember, a powerful add-on to the researchers array of data. However, on the flip side, we are being bombarded with data so it is important to extract meaningful insights (rather than drown in stats!) utilising the skills of the researchers and analysts. I can see more dashboards appearing.

Another invaluable tool in understanding who your customers are, where they are and how to find more of them is the geo-demographic tool MOSAIC. There are key population changes that influence consumer behaviour, for example the boomerang generation – young adults staying living at home longer therefore affecting the household expenditure which is reflected in the MOSAIC type: Boomerang Boarders. There are now 2 groups, Transient Renters and Rental Hubs reflecting the growth in the renting population. We need to be mindful of the trends and the implications on the marketing and communicating of brands and services. What is the impact of the Rurban Migration? With any trends there is an opportunity for brands and services, we just need to find them.

But what we were lacking in the current classification and how MOSAIC has now caught up is the digital view of the UK population. We can now see which MOSAIC types are more likely to be Facebookers with Student Scene (76%) and Flying Solo (69%) being the top MOSAIC types. There is a wealth of added digital insights within the segmentation which will again add to our insight toolkit.

The world is changing and very significantly, is the way you communicate with your consumer, this means the data illustrating these trends and insights must also evolve. At AMS we keep abreast of all the latest insight and tools using data to lead our planning.

- Amanda

The Best Brands April Fool's of 2014

Brands seem to have gone all out this year for April Fool's.

Saatchi & Saatchi Thailand created an app for clients to handle agencies efficiently.

Here are the best of the rest!

1. Peugot UK announce their new horns and their advert features our very own Heather!

2. Our lovely client, Tick Tock Tea announce a new flavour...

3. YouTube tells us what's going viral in 2014

4. Domino's introduce the EdiBox - the first edible pizza box

5. Samsung discover the best way to bring WiFi to London...pigeons!

6. Rosetta Stone finally can teach you one of the most popular languages of the 21st Century

7. Warburtons to build twin skyscrapers next to the Gherkin

8. ancestry.com develops a new method for DNA testing

9. Reddit introducses 'headdit': a new way to browse!

10. And finally, The Clintons have a giggle

- Jess

Comms Strategy – The Role and Challenges

“In today’s marketing and media environment, only the naïve and foolish confuse presence with impact”, Stephen Heyer former COO, Coca Cola

We are living in the eye of a perfect data storm: digitalisation, socialisation, device ownership, connected consumers, media meshing, always-on lifestyles, data capture, campaign and market reports, results…Whilst these provide a richly quantifiable landscape for marketers and agencies alike, the goal is to make meaning from this data, to extract insight and intelligence. Being awash in numbers means knowing how to swim - if you don’t want to drown.

Strategic planning’s role can best be simplified as addressing two important questions – where do we play, and how do we win? The former means knowing where to influence consumers along their path to purchase, and which particular times and places to focus on, ensuring the desired outcome, e.g. awareness. The latter means knowing enough about how media consumption overlaps with human behaviour to better plan for the desired outcomes. Often these are tricky outcomes such as driving reappraisal and adoption, and they must be done in a way that outwits the competition or maximises the consumer response.

Whilst wider media planning is perhaps more strictly about reaching the right people at the right time for the right cost, comms planning is more about influencing them. This requires a better understanding of how audiences receive and respond to comms. The starting point is therefore the consumer, not the media channel or the discipline.

The strategist must ensure all loops are closed and that we have an integrated whole; only that way is a comprehensive campaign possible. Having a single strategy means having a consistent story, a unified narrative. It ensures we have meaning. This is what people buy into both literally and metaphorically when they buy into brands. Without meaning or relevance, advertising is an irritant or an irrelevance. Fundamentally, marketing is about selling more stuff to more people. However, selling it more frequently (persuasion), for more money (enhancing the product’s perceived value) to a newly attracted larger audience (identifying opportunities and need-states) is the ideal. This requires a greater perspective, and an integrated structure that brings all the objectives into alignment.

Comms strategy addresses real business needs to the base planning. It goes beyond meeting the objectives, and helps to deliver a true competitive advantage. This requires trade-offs, making an informed decision on what not to do as much as where to play and how to win.

At AMS we aim to achieve all of the above by monitoring and learning from the competition and to identify new or overlooked opportunities. This means keeping abreast of technology and media opportunities, being informed about industry learnings, and maintaining fresh thinking on consumer behaviour and psychology. All in all it means synthesising the worthwhile data to make our responses as up to date, innovative, robust, and commercially minded as possible - taking us full circle and back into that perfect storm once again.

- Luke

Who’s the Slave and who’s the Master?

The movie 12 Years a Slave has been rightly lauded as one of the most moving stories of the last two centuries for its portrayal of extreme human suffering, underpinned by a fight for freedom and justice.

Thankfully slavery has all but disappeared from the western world (if not necessarily beyond) and words such as “constraints”, “punishments”, “shackles” and “discrimination” are much less commonly used today.

Or are they?

Where they might be less out of place, however, is when applied to the business practices of large global network media agencies and how they treat their clients.

Unlike in the tale of Solomon Northup, where it was easy to see who the victim was, there is a whole grey area within media about where the power really lies. Who truly is the Master and who the Slave?

The global networks have become so powerful over recent years that it is difficult to see what influence a client truly has on how their own media budget is spent.

For their clients, especially those with niche target audiences or multi-layered briefs, it can be a bit like being shown a glimpse of freedom, only to discover that they have become shackled by the chains of agency group deal structures, inflexible booking deadlines, inadequate account team service levels and unexpected additional costs for tasks beyond the basic.

This is not to say that the big network agencies are not capable of great planning, innovative solutions and building strong client relationships, but that the demands of the true “Masters” (the group owners of the main networks) really are the ones calling the shots, not the individual clients.

At AMS we are a completely independent agency without any external ownership and therefore, no Master to answer to other than our clients and ourselves. We prefer to keep the relationship simple, focussed and undiluted, to such a degree that there is no “slave” and there is no “master”, just a long term partnership of like-minded businesses striving to achieve common goals.

Recently, we have been invited to meet with several clients who have lost faith in the large networks, either for reasons of disillusionment about the neutrality of their planning, the quality of the day to day service they receive or the lack of flexibility offered when it was needed.

This is all great news for us in the independent sector, as it demonstrates that there is certainly still a demand for bespoke media strategies, rather than process-driven solutions.

Our recently launched website articulates this tailor-made approach in the form of a clear client proposition; beyond brand ambition, in that we have a great track record for delivering above target growth for brands large or small and not just in the short term.

It’s an inherent benefit of being truly free to do what works for our clients, rather than what works for our owners.

There are no artificial “constraints” built into our contracts, no “discrimination” between clients by size, no “shackles” on media selection and no ”punishments” for missing deadlines. Like Solomon, perhaps it’s time more clients questioned just how much freedom they actually have and when they do, we at AMS will be more than happy to help them break out of those chains.

- Paul Phelps

Emerging Social Networks

A question often asked by brand managers to the social team here is: “what are some new social platforms that we can jump on to give us a first mover advantage?”

Or they might say: “so I heard about social network X in the Metro, what’s the deal?”, and sometimes it’s: “my kid has Snapchat… what is it, and how do we get on there??”

Occasionally, upstart social networks like Snapchat, Jelly, Medium, Viddy and others make mainstream news for reasons such as rumoured acquisition by one of the larger social networks, security breaches or general buzz created by a new service they provide. When that happens, they briefly come onto the radar and it’s natural for a brand to think that we could be missing a trick by not being involved.

So how do we decide the appropriateness of a new platform when thinking about the possible earned media opportunity to be gained?

First, as we would with all ‘established’ social networks, we closely look at ‘new’ platforms to determine how their community USPs align with the proposition of our brand. Some social networks are better than others for getting across the brand’s visual characteristics. Others are more appropriate for answering questions or presenting the brand as a thought leader. We review current audience numbers and demographics of the new social network to discover where they may over-index against a certain pen portrait or age range.

If these factors align strongly with the target audience a brand is looking to engage with, putting time and resource into an ongoing presence on that platform might very well be a good idea.

Today’s robust social media news cycle (Mashable, Reddit, AllTop & others) provides a virtuous circle for brands that create innovative strategies on new social platforms. By their nature, these news outlets promote the merits and usage of emerging social media channels and often go out of their way to highlight clever brand strategies that use the USPs of the platform to their full potential. Being a first mover with the powerful platform-relevant strategy may attract the attention of these news outlets and offers ‘free’ press that can be seen by potentially hundreds of thousands of new customers. The benefits of building community on a new social network will often be outweighed by the traffic surge and brand mentions that a clever strategy highlighted by the powerful social media press machine can deliver. Zappos, Etsy & Volkswagen are among a group of forward thinking brands well known for leveraging emerging social platforms specifically for the wider media attention they receive from doing so.

When considering if an emerging social platform is appropriate for us, we would analyse whether the platform’s USPs are a good match for the proposition, demographics and earned media potential of the brand. Provided it ticks those boxes, and the idea is bold enough to make headlines, we would love the opportunity to "get on there."

- Curtis

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