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HOW & WHY

Consumers Find and Consume Content Online

Nick Drew Research Manager, Yahoo!

#YahooResearch @YahooAdBuzzCA

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“IT’S THE CONTENT, STUPID!”

We know that there are significant differences in how consumers use different online sources of news, sports and other content – this research set out to understand those

differences in more detail, the reasons for them, and what they mean for brands.

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WHAT WE DID

Review of existing thinking.

In-depth discussions with experts.

Detailed qualitative work with Canadian consumers.

Quantitative study among 2,000 Canadian internet users.

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CANADIANS’ MEDIA HABITS

Sources: TVB 2011/12, 2006/7; NADbank top 19 markets,; comScore Feb ’07, Feb ‘12

TELEVISION

Watch 27.4hrs per week.

Increase of 3% since 2007.

NEWSPAPERS

12.2m weekly readers.

Readership up 3% since 2007.

INTERNET

65.7bn minutes a month spent on the internet.

14% increase since 2007.

Canadians’ overall media consumption continues to evolve, but not necessarily in directions that we would expect – TV and print are still an important part of consumers’ lives.

*comScore

SPORTS

NEWS

THE WHOLE WORLD ONLINE

And online, we know that consumers’ behaviour is also evolving. Retail continues to grow; online banking is developing further; photo sharing is exploding.

BUT SOME CONSTANTS STILL REMAIN

More Canadians visit NEWS sites than use social networks each month

The top 7 publishers account for more than half the time spent on SPORTS sites each month

In the last 2 years, the share of time spent on the 10 biggest LIFESTYLE sites has grown by 60%

25% more Canadians use FINANCIAL NEWS sites now than did 3 years ago.

Despite this growing sophistication online, there are some constants in behaviour. There’s still a need for quality content online, and consumers are gravitating

towards the big publishers in each genre for that content.

CONSUMERS STILL HAVE TRADITIONAL NEEDS

66% ARE REGULAR ONLINE NEWS USERS

22% ARE SPORTS FANS

36% REGULARLY USE LIFESTYLE CONTENT ONLINE

In total, 8 out of 10 Canadian internet users are regular online consumers of news, sports or lifestyle content.

ENGAGEMENT COMES IN SEVERAL FLAVOURS

GOING DEEPER

Least frequent, delving into a particular topic; read several articles for analysis, perspective or opinion.

20% of internet users go deep with news online every day.

CATCHING UP

Most frequent and functional, quick check of headlines and what's happening.

54% of internet users catch up on news online each day.

TAKING A BREAK

Fill a little time, read an article or two, watch a couple of videos, check a handful of other sites.

53% of sports fans take a break with sports online most days.

BOOKMARKS SHARING

FORUMS LINKS IN EMAIL

APPS

TRADITIONAL NEEDS, NEW METHODS OF DISCOVERY

Browsing content sites

Direct to SPECIFIC PUBLISHERS

51% 58%

How people discover this content is changing. Social is growing in importance as a means of finding good content, but the majority of users still visit their preferred sites in

each genre and browse around.

CONTENT FOLLOWS PEOPLE ACROSS DEVICES

During the Olympics,

61% of the traffic to the

(Canadian) consortium’s

digital properties came

from mobile devices

(As reported 3rd August

2012)

I really depend on 680

News and CP 24 News

Alerts during the day…

on my work phone

m, 34

Usually before I go

to bed, lying in bed,

I have my laptop on

the bed, I might

read an article

m, 28

And good content is now channel-agnostic – people can consume it wherever they are, whatever they’re doing, through whichever device they have to hand.

…AND THROUGH THEIR DAILY ROUTINES

THE NEWS FAN

The research showed that people tap into their particular genres of interest throughout their daily habits, through a range of outlets.

THE SPORTS FAN

…AND THROUGH THEIR DAILY ROUTINES

DISTINCTIONS EXIST BETWEEN SOURCES

Across genres, there were clear distinctions for consumers about the sites they use to discover content, and those they then go to to consume that content.

HOW DO WE DEFINE THESE DISTINCTIONS?

“ Expertise: it’s quality if the consumer learned something by watching or reading it. ”

Jason Rapp, President, Maholo

“What’s most important is timeliness,

constant updating, relevance to the

audience; aggregating, your expert voice, and… getting contributors …engaged in the conversation”

Lewis Dvorkin, CPO Forbes

“Consumers will decide whether it’s

useful to them; and editors will decide whether the contributions… meet their standards.”

Luke Beatty, TechStars

The difficulty lies in explaining what makes those differences – why some sites are better than others for news, sports, finance or lifestyle content.

COMPARING SOURCES

And so, through the research, we set out to understand that framework. We compared 15 different websites from news, sports and lifestyle.

BUT WHAT DOES ‘QUALITY’ MEAN? HOW DO USERS COMPARE SITES?

46

43 42

39

35 33

31 31 30

25 23

21

9 7

4 0

10

20

30

40

50 Perceived quality of website (% saying high quality)

…and asked our respondents what they thought of the quality of each of them. There was a clear consensus of opinion.

We then took the top 5 sites, and the 4 lowest-quality sites, and compared them further

BUT WHAT DOES ‘QUALITY’ MEAN?

LOW QUALITY SITES

8.7

HIGH QUALITY

SITES 32.7

Likelihood to read webpage (% saying they would)

Firstly, respondents were asked about readability – how likely they would be to read each of these sites as a source of news, sports or lifestyle content.

Poor quality

Trustworthy Informative Biased

Insightful

Features leading

columnists/ writers

For someone like me

Well- organised

Well-written

Worth sharing

WHAT MAKES IT WORTH READING?

Easy to read

Believable

Annoying

Entertaining

Easy to navigate

Has something

for everyone

Something I’m interested

in

Funny

Inspiring

Provides original

viewpoints

Sensationalistic

Provides local info

Visually Appealing

Popular

Worth paying for

Has enough detail

Has a good reputation

Frequently updated

The focus then shifted to describing these sites.

Inspiring

24%

11%

Inspiring 24%

Easy to read 80%

35%

Informative 77%

30%

Well written

Well written

74%

33%

Insightful

Insightful

51%

21%

Entertaining

Entertaining

42%

22%

Worth sharing

Worth sharing

57%

23%

42%

15%

COMPARING SOURCES

High quality sites Low quality sites

14 attributes were found to be the best indicators of site readability; unsurprisingly, the high-quality and low-quality sites performed very differently on these metrics

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

Category 1 Category 3 Category 2

Visually Appealing

65%

18%

About Something

I’m interested In

65%

18%

55%

13%

For someone

like me 48%

13%

COMPARING SOURCES High quality sites Low quality sites

…with differences of nearly 400% in the proportion of respondents saying the sites showed these attributes.

WHAT DOES QUALITY MEAN FOR BRANDS?

Quality’s an important concept for brands as well. When consumers are presented with a product or brand they haven’t tried before, they use visual and other cues to assess whether to try this product. Environment and its quality plays an important

part in this process.

REALLY?

To test this concept in practice, the research placed a series of ads on the webpages shown to respondents. The results were then aggregated and compared.

49

30

ADS ARE MORE MEMORABLE

10 5

High quality sites Low quality sites

When ads were seen on the high-quality pages, ad cut-through and recall was 50% higher than when the same ads were seen on the low-quality pages.

TRUSTWORTHY

25

31

High quality sites Low quality sites

POOR QUALITY

19

10

VISUALLY APPEALING

29

39

16

29

GOOD FIT WITH THE SITE

ENTERTAINING

11

17

…AND THEY’RE SEEN MORE FAVOURABLY

And respondents felt more positively about the ads as well when shown them in the high-quality environments.

ULTIMATELY, ADS HAVE A GREATER IMPACT

6

4

9

6

High quality sites Low quality sites

Brand impact was 50% higher simply by placing the ads on higher-quality pages.

BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER

Consumers still have traditional needs for news, sports, financial news

and lifestyle content.

Ways of discovering this content have changed, but how users

determine what’s worth their time has not.

Websites that provide informative, well-written, believable and well-

laid out content are seen as better sources.

Ads benefit from this source quality

…and perform significantly better on high-quality sites.

BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER

Ultimately, the message is a familiar one. Consumers know what they want, and they know how and where to get it. While more and more people are getting their

news and sports fixes online, the essential attributes of what makes it worth reading or watching remain the same regardless of medium: trustworthiness, how well written it is, how relevant it is. For marketers, the key is to understand these

distinctions, and motivations; and ensure they are reflected in a brand’s messaging and marketing frameworks, to better engage with the audience wherever they are.

advertising.yahoo.ca

@YahooAdBuzzCA

Nick Drew Research Manager, Yahoo!

ndrew@yahoo-inc.com