Comscore-digitalAt ad:tech Singapore 2012, Greg Dale, CEO of comScore, talked a lot about the great medium internet, and how it is possible now to reach people now via social and video marketing, especially on mobile devices, here in Asia.  He further elborated on a freshly launched comScore study that focued on bringing all research the company has done in the past couple of years together.

According to Greg, ComScore really wanted to check again if the media industry is serving ads to people that really look at them. Their study shows that about one third of the ads that are paid for are never seen by a consumer. So, when you you run a campaign and try to measure performance and you don‘t know that a third of the people didn‘t see it, you‘re going to underestimate how well that ad performed. Giving in to issues such as visibility, brand safety, being able to hit target and to do that in real time, start really bringing the promise of what digital advertising should be. As we mature and bring those tools to the market, it will help us all move forward.

In his presentation on the „State of the Global and Local Internet and the Lessons Learned from the Digital Measurement Trenches Of Online Advertising“  Greg emphasized comScore’s Unified Digital Measurement (UDM) approach that leverages the best of panel and server data figures.

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Greg went on to speak about a global and local view of today‘s digital landscape, presenting the global internet user in figures, see graph.

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Summarized, the key takeaways from Greg‘s presentation were:

Asia’s place in the global digital landscape:

• Large, growing and young Internet audiences highlight tremendous potential for the region

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• Penetration and engagement levels still have room to grow.

Social networking dominates online experience:

• Brands need to understand the extended reach of fans, friends and social media ads and how these fit into overall digital strategy.

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E-commerce in Asia is growing, but still lags behind the U.S. and Europe:

• Local e-commerce brands entering the market will help fuel continued growth and increase consumer confidence in purchasing online.

Online video landscape developing, move towards long form content:

• Online video opening up big opportunities for advertisers.

• YouTube channels introducing new segments.

Smartphone and tablets fuel the rise of the Digital Omnivore:

• Mobile platforms are disrupting the digital landscape;

• Publishers and advertisers need to understand how people are using devices differently throughout the day to best hone digital strategies.

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Ad Validation will be critical in driving growth in the digital market:

• There are real campaign performance issues happening all the time, therefore, companies need to be on top of their campaigns everyday;

• Key metrics like viewability will drive the conversation in the digital ad economy;

• Validation from a single provider will become increasingly important to advertisers and agencies.

Greg concluded with „giving in to issues such as visibility, brand safety, being able to hit target, and being able to do that in real time, start really bringing the promise of what digital advertising should be. As we mature and bring those tools to the market, it will help us all move forward.“

By Anjum Siddiqi