Tag Archives: media

Measurement, Social Media

Watch the throne: Who takes the media crown during royal weddings?

If it seems like Harry and Meghan have taken over your social media feeds, or you’ve been sucked in to the wall-to-wall news coverage about the Royal Wedding, you’re not alone.  No matter whether you live in the U.K., commonwealth countries, or even in the U.S.A., it feels like the whole world is on edge for the Windsor family’s next wedding. You might even call it the most anticipated wedding since Robb Stark married Talisa (although hopefully with a happier ending).

And this is nothing new – back in 2011 I used Nielsen’s analytics tools to measure media buzz about Harry’s older brother Prince William marrying the future Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton.  Surprisingly we found that American news outlets covered that Royal Wedding more frequently than their UK or Commonwealth counterparts. Back then William was most mentioned in social media, except in the UK where Brittons were abuzz about the people’s princess.  Overall Americans made the most noise about the Royal Wedding in social media, although Brittons had a higher share-of-voice on the topic, which seemed to be on everyone’s mind up to the big day.

It seems like history is repeating itself for Prince Harry, so I thought it might be fun to take one last look back at the first Royal Wedding of the social media age: Continue reading Watch the throne: Who takes the media crown during royal weddings? →

Broadcast, Measurement, Mobile, Visualization, Work

Hitchhiker’s Guide: Mapping the Consumer Media Universe

Mapping the Media Universe as a solar system of devices
(click to enlarge the Media Universe infographic)

The media universe is constantly expanding, so as consumers adopt more devices and gadgets their usage of how they watch, shop, and connect continues to evolve; today the media universe revolves around the consumer.  As the media landscape changes, PRs, Advertisers, and Marketers must navigate this new media universe, understanding not just all the gadgets consumers own, but also how they use media across devices to form their own behaviors.

Working with Nielsen’s data to provide insights into cross-platform media usage, I helped design the 2012 Consumer Usage Report from concept through completion, including the above inforgraphic meant to help navigate the media universe just in time for CES in January 2013.  Using the common marketing metaphor of the “universe”, meaning all people in the target audience, this visualization provides a snapshot overview of the US media market.  Visualizing the media universe as a solar system of planets (devices) which revolve around the sun (consumers), this infographic maps consumer ownership of digital devices (computers, mobile, tablets, etc) and devices connected to the TV (cable/satellite, game consoles, etc).  Pulling these devices together is gravity, illustrated by how are consumers spending their media time, and some may be surprised that the overwhelming majority of time spent (150+ hours per month) is watching traditional and time-shifted TV.

At the same time consumers’ media habits are rapidly changing, and the media universe continues to expand to incorporare new devices akin to a technological big bang.  During 2012 smartphones became the majority of mobile users in the US for the first time, and nearly 1 in 5 households now owns a tablet computer.  Social media usage continues to grow, and while many more consumers are using it on the go most still connect to social networks using their home computers.  And for cord-cutters like me who get much of their viewing through online stream sites, it may be surprising to learn only 4% of households own IPTV sets, but with 56% of homes using video game consoles it seems likely at least a few are watching video on Netflix and Hulu on their TVs as well.


To learn more about the how consumers use tech and media in their daily lives, please download the full report from Nielsen’s website.  And to see more examples of infographics and data visualizations I’ve worked on, check out my portfolio on this site.

Ideas

American Forum

@acarvin and Katheryn Montgomery
@aCarvin and Katheryn Montgomery

“Are Media Making Us Dumber?” The question may sound like an oxymoron in an age where information is instantly accessible, but ubiquity of human knowledge does not always equal individual understanding. So how are media changing the way we learn and communicate important ideas?

I went to an American Forum last night to hear different perspectives on the issue and try to get a few answers.  Although consensus was difficult to reach in this panel discussion between academics and communications professionals, I think everyone agreed that people read a website differently than a book or newspaper article. Continue reading American Forum →