How robust are the digital champions?

 

This post originally appeared on BUSINESS SPECTATOR

If 20 years ago someone told you that in the future the largest, most valuable emerging media companies wouldn’t have to create content you would have scoffed.

Media companies lived and died by the quality of the content they produced and the quality of the media brands they created and nurtured. Now days the situation has changed rather dramatically.

There are media brands today that don’t actually create their own content and have no intention of doing so.

Google, Facebook, Digg, Twitter, Techmeme and YouTube are all companies with differing missions, significant valuations – but with no aspiration of creating content.

They are simply facilitators – companies that contribute to the fulfilment of a need or furtherance of an effort or purpose. Google is the best example of this.

Pre-Google, the internet was a heaving, disorganised mess. It was difficult to find what you wanted and this was challenging the medium and its future usability.

Google came in and created a tool that allowed internet users to find what they needed quickly and easily. It reinvented search and has allowed consumers to get anything they want, whenever they want, and for the price they want – generally for free.

At the same time, the company that is now commonly referred to as the ’search engine giant’ created an advertising tool that was so simple, effective, and scalable that it completely changed the ad world.

In doing this, Google has became more valuable in the eyes of investors and consumers than the companies that are actually creating the content. And at the same time it has initiated a significant shift in how media is consumed.

At the beginning of November Google was valued at $US169.68bn. This is more than Disney/ABC, News Corporation, Viacom, Time Warner, CBS and Yahoo! combined.

So now, the race seems to be on to find the next great organiser of content rather than the next great creator.

Facebook is perceived as many as the next company to reach Google-esque heights. Like Google, it doesn’t ‘create’ content in the traditional sense.

What it does is provide a platform for others to share their content and connect with others and it’s 250 million global users seem to value this.

Twitter is another company with lofty market expectations. It’s valued at around $US1 billion after its last round of funding and is the current ‘darling’ of the media and advertising industry.

Both Facebook and Twitter are connectors. Their purpose is to help people connect with others and many commentators and industry folk would say that the value they are creating is in community.

Like Google they organise information and make it useful, but to their detriment neither has a killer commercial model.

What is yet to be determined is the true value of ‘community’ in the long term – both commercially and for consumers.

There is undoubtedly a consumer value to a user of a facilitator, however, is there a danger of building a business that relies on others to create the end product?

Facebook relies on its users to post content, pictures, thoughts and links but a user’s Facebook experience is only as good their network. Twitter is the same – the value users get from Twitter is only as good as who they are following and how active and interesting they are.

Both Facebook and Twitter have minimal control over this. They can improve technical and usability aspects but they can’t guide content – they are controlled by their users.

Google doesn’t create content, but it does control its product, how its packaged and what it serves up. The difference between a Google and a Facebook or Twitter is significant.

User controlled media is nothing new in a digital sense. In the early days of the ‘modern internet’ forums were a big deal. Many sites would add forum functionality as it served two key purposes; it gave users a reason to return (hence boosting frequency) and it was great for page view generators (boosting engagement).

However, in some cases the forums became bigger than the site and often changed what the brand meant, sometimes in a negative way. Many sites had great, rational content but were defined as brands by the vocal bullies on their forums.

Like forums, if the interesting people lose interest in Facebook or Twitter, generally other users will too. And this can happen quickly. Two years ago MySpace was the dominant social network in Australia, now Facebook has over three times as many users – 7.8 million.

With that in mind, what is the long term value of these facilitators as media brands? How can they build value over time? How can they build trust? Or do they become commodities – like email, like instant messenger and RSS?

Generally, media brands have become valuable due to a mix of content, cultural relevance and public perception. All three are equally important.

What does a Facebook stand for? Or Twitter? Or YouTube? As a user, what do they say about me? As an advertiser, what can they do to help me position my brand?

In some ways it’s not too dissimilar to the crazy world of hospitality. A club is effectively a facilitator – a facilitator that allows people to relax, meet people and discover new music.

You can open a club put in the best sound system, the most comfortable seating the best lighting rig, fantastic staff and a great selection of drinks. You can have fantastic entertainment a central location and plush fittings. For one, two, maybe three years, the place will be in demand and busy.

Technically and functionally everything is sound. But at any time, everything can change and for seemingly no reason people will flee. For reasons that can’t be distilled into rational reasoning people tend to lose interest and move on. And because some people move on, others follow. Generally there’s nothing the club can do. Sure, they can renovate, bring in new features, entertainment etc. But once that edge is gone, it’s generally gone for good.

So the big question facing Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, is whether, in this sense, they are the nightclubs of the digital media world.

Online off the boil

This piece originally ran on BUSINESS SPECTATOR

Every three months the Interactive Advertising Bureau of Australia releases figures around the advertising revenue performance of the digital media industry.

Generally they’re pretty predictable. It’s not a matter of whether the industry is growing, the question is always around how much it is growing.

You see, in digital media double digit growth isn’t an exception, it’s the norm. While TV, radio and outdoor celebrate small 2/3/4 per cent increases, digital expects 20+ per cent growth whenever figures are reported.

When calendar year Q2 results were reported last May, many (including me) were expecting the numbers to be bloody and potentially flat or down revenue-wise. Turns out I was wrong and the industry was up 16 per cent.

At the time, I said the following on my Talking Digital blog:

It would worry publishers and the IAB that digital is so heavily reliant on three categories for spend.

Auto, Computers and Technology and Finance represent 46 per cent of total display revenues for Q1 2009. In Q1 2008 they represented 51 per cent. It’s down year-on-year but still a massive chunk of the pie.

Of those three categories only Automotive saw a rise – up 12 per cent year-on-year. Surprising considering the state of the market and the reports around significant auto marketing budget cuts.

So, this week the IAB and PWC released the ad revenue figures for Q3 2009. .

For Q3 the digital advertising pool totalled $466 million, up 3 per cent on the Q2 figure, and up 3 per cent year-on-year.  (edit original claim of a 3% drop is incorrect – my error … there wasn’t a 3% YOY drop … there was a 2.8% rise)

And overall for the last 12 months investment in digital advertising has totalled $1.82 billion – a significant figure.

So what has contributed to the first year-on-year decline in six years?

Understandably, classified revenue is down. It’s down 5 per cent year-on-year. Paid Search is up 12 per cent year-on-year. Solid numbers, but many have predicted year-on-year search increases of 20 per cent or more between now and 2012. Still, there is no sign the search juggernaut is slowing down and it now accounts for 51 per cent of digital advertising investment in Australia. Another key consideration is that one company dominates paid search in Australia, with Google commanding approximately 94 per cent of the total search market (which – unless disaster strikes – should become a $1 billion annual business within the next six months).

For classifieds, the last three quarters have seen revenue decreases. Maybe the digital rivers of gold are drying up? Or maybe they were flooding earlier and have retreated back to normal levels?

The decrease in display advertising revenue would be of some concern. Display advertising revenue basically refers to banners and buttons you see on websites. It also includes other things, such as integration and advertorial, but the majority is banners and related display media.

The display advertising component of the overall digital advertising pie accounts for around 26 per cent of total revenues, however it’s extremely competitive.

Search is a monopoly – Google controls the market. Classifieds are either monopolies or duopolies in the key categories of employment, real estate and automotive.

However, no one company dominates display advertising. Five key players account for about 50 per cent of revenue – those being Ninemsn, Fairfax, News, Bigpond and Yahoo! – with the other 50 per cent spread out across anywhere from 100 to 200 smaller operators.

So a 5 per cent year-on-year revenue drop in a category that is already far too crowded would be somewhat alarming.

However, when you actually look closer at the figures the story isn’t as dire as it may appear.

Above I referred to my earlier concerns around the Automotive, Finance and IT categories accounting for 47 per cent of investment in digital display media. My concern revolved around a reliance on three categories and the potential impact of all three of these categories having a bad quarter on the overall market.

Unfortunately, all three of the categories had shocking Q3’s in terms of ad spend.

Finance was down 10 per cent year-on-year. IT was down 33 per cent. Automotive down 29 per cent. These are significant hits.

With this in mind, a 5 per cent dip in display revenue for Q3 2009 isn’t a bad achievement. Add to this year-on-year increases in FMCG, Health and Entertainment ad spend and the picture isn’t too bad. Q3 2009 was always going to be tough given how robust Q3 2008 was – buoyed by an extremely strong economy earlier in 2008 as well as significant investment and interest around the Beijing Olympics.

One thing Q3 has really shown is the industry’s reliance on a few categories. Bodies such as the IAB are working towards lessening this reliance on these key categories, but they can’t do it alone. More work and collaboration from all elements of the industry – media agencies, creative agencies and publishers – is required.

The ultimate aim? Showing advertisers and marketers how you can help build brands online.

This has yet to be proven, but the most recent revenue figures show that it’s a question that needs to be answered sooner rather than later if the industry wants to maintain double digital growth into the next decade.

Facebook’s Big Chance

This piece originally ran on BUSINESS SPECTATOR

Facebook is often perceived as the elephant in the digital media room. Generally none of the big players really want to talk about it.

And whilst the platform isn’t, right now, commercially much of a threat to the existing digital powers, it could well be in the future.

The word is that as a company it is profitable. Recent funding rounds have meant they have large amounts of cash reserves, and with this they are aggressively pursuing talent.

Make no mistake, Facebook considers itself in a similar zone to Google – not just a media company but a company designed to create a positive impact on people’s lives.

Now, to date, Facebook’s attempts to commercialise its significant user-base have been relatively awkward. Its self-service ad platform is helping change this, but the company has failed to nail a compelling advertising product with the scale required to even begin to meet market expectations.

However, Facebook – either by accident or design – now has its sights set on a bigger scalp – the local reliance on Yahoo! and MSN on traffic, revenue and engagement from their email and messenger properties.

And what Facebook could do to disturb these two operators could, long-term, be a lot more damaging than an ad product. It threatens their very survival.

It’s funny when you think about it. The web has evolved so much over the last 15 years, but the properties people spend the most time on outside of Facebook are generally the oldest and most boring, email and instant messenger.

Both of these tools became mass in the late 90s, but 10 years on their respective owners rely on them more than they would like.

What Facebook has done is change the landscape. It has made people less reliant on email for personal communication and has made real time exchanges of words, images and data easy and centralised.

For many, it’s replacing email and messenger – or at least reducing the user’s reliance on these tools.

At the same time, some advertisers are reconsidering whether they use these practical communication channels as vessels for paid advertising. Are they really the right environment or are there better places to engage the right consumer?

In Australia, ninemsn has the leading email platform and the leading messenger platform. Ninemsn Messenger has 5.38 million users each month, eight times that of Yahoo! Messenger (which has 618,000 users). Windows Live Hotmail is the leading email service on the web, with 4.58 million users. Yahoo! Mail is number three (behind Gmail) with 1.78 million users per month. (Source: Nielsen Netview, October 2009.)

Impressive numbers no doubt. However it’s not all smooth sailing.

Generally online publishers talk in total network terms – ie, “we have x million users across our network spending x amount of time with us every month”.

Time spent is an important metric for advertisers – it’s one metric they can use to see how engaging and important to readers a publisher’s content is. Advertisers want to align with quality content and loyal audiences.

Ninemsn has a challenge. A massive amount of the time their users spend with their network is across Mail and Messenger – an awful lot.

In September 2009 users spent a total of 1.96 billion minutes on the site. Of those minutes, 1.68 billion were on Mail or Messenger.

Which means that combined, Mail and Messenger account for 86 per cent of the time spent on ninemsn. This means as properties they are incredibly important for the company in all aspects – user retention, repeat visitation and revenue.

For Yahoo! the situation is also potentially alarming. In September 2009 users spent 567 million minutes on Yahoo!7. 355 million of those minutes were on Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger. This represents 63 per cent of total time spent on the site.

If you take Mail and Messenger usage out of both of these networks numbers they don’t look nearly as impressive as they do with them included. What it does show is a massive reliance on two tools that seem to be losing user relevance at a rapid rate.

What happens in three to five years as email and messenger continue to lose relevance and the new social web continues to take users’ attention? What impact will this have on both of these businesses? What do they have left to sell?

Another consideration is around how important these properties are at driving users to other, perhaps more valuable, content areas of the networks. Without large volume around these ‘entry points’ there’s a challenge to hold/build audience in these valuable content categories.

If this was a TV network, it would be the equivalent of a network relying on two pieces of programming to generate the bulk of viewing time. I’d imagine – not having worked at a TV network – that this would be considered risky.

So, while Facebook right now wouldn’t be ‘stealing share’ in a revenue sense from the main players, in the long-term it appears to be in the middle of inflicting some serious structural damage.

New Column on Business Spectator

Gday. I’ve been reasonably quiet on here for the last few weeks … the reason for this is I’ve begun a weekly commentary around media/digital/advertising etc on Business Spectator. (http://www.businessspectator.com.au)

Alan Kohler approached me with the idea and it was something I couldn’t refuse. Business Spectator is a great site with the best business journalists in the country. Why they want my “media loony” rants is beyond me … but they seem keen on the idea and I couldn’t be happier.

So every Thursday I’ll be running a commentary/column on the site. It’ll be available from the frontpage. For the remainder of the year I’ll be focusing on making these commentaries as tight as possible so my blog output will be pretty slim.

I’ll be linking to these pieces through this blog so email subscribers will still be alerted when something new is posted.

Enjoy and thanks for reading, commenting, abusing.

http://www.businessspectator.com.au

Great article by Optimedia US CEO, Antony Young

Saw this over the weekend and thought it was worth passing on.

Optimedia US CEO Antony Young has written a piece claiming ‘Hulu is an H-Bomb Ready to Destroy the TV Industry’. And he might be right.

No one is questioning that Hulu is a great product, as a user … but commercially it could pose some real problems to those involved reasonably soon.

Young’s article looks at a few key factors that are often used by those who are involved in these ventures.

1/ If we don’t do it, someone else will

2/ Consumers want it, hence we have to give it to them

3/ It will ultimately increase TV audiences

I like his closing quote “As a media buyer, I have no vested interest in whether the broadcaster shareholders support Hulu or not. Our livelihood as an agency relies neither on supporting the status quo of traditional media nor blindly pushing the popular wisdom of digital everything.”

http://www.businessinsider.com/hulu-is-an-h-bomb-that-will-destroy-the-tv-industry-2009-10

One thing that is interesting is the comments are all very dismissive of Young’s view. Which is kind of sad as he makes sense and in a way it shows how far away from commercially competent many involved in digital are. I think many of these comments are a result of those making them not understanding the cost realities of creating content and the revenue performance of broadcast TV.

News and Fairfax should shut their online newspapers?

Cool headline hey?

I thought I’d borrow a tactic from the mainstream press to get your opinion on a hypothetical scenario.

I had breakfast with a friend of mine who is a lot smarter than me yesterday. We were talking about media and the apparent will of some operators to completely ruin what are extremely robust ‘traditional’ businesses to try and make a fraction of that revenue online in what is a much smaller overall category with 10’s if not 100’s more competitors.

Now this guy isn’t another media loony like me, he’s actually remarkably sane.

From my research, the newspaper advertising market is  worth over $4b in Australia. 30% of that is classifieds … the rest is retail or national. That means around $2.5b is non classifieds.

The below newspaper data is sourced from The Newspaper Works, primarily a presentation called ‘The Australian Newspaper Market March 2009′ which is available on their website (signup required, heh)

Metro newspapers account for around $2.3b of that figure. Seeing 70% of revenue is non classifieds, metro newspapers are seeing around $1.6b of revenue come through from brand or retail advertisers.

That’s $1.6b in what we digital people would call DISPLAY revenue.

The total digital display pie in the 12 months to June 30 2009 was $491m. That is the total – across all categories and that includes performance advertising, networks, affiliates etc. This data has been sourced from the most recent IAB PWC Digital Advertising figures (to June 30, 2009)

It would be generally agreed that newspapers offer operators better yield/revenue per reader than digital. So, in essence, a print newspaper reader is worth more than the same reader online.

Given the digital display pie to June 30 2009 was $491m … how much was the revenue proportion going to the online versions of newspapers – primarily News Digital Media and Fairfax Digital ones?

This is a guess, but I’d say around the $80m mark.

$80m versus $1.6b. It’s a big difference. Hell, my estimate could be 25% of the real figures (say the real figure was $320m – which it isn’t) and the diffence would still be massive.

Now – based on $80m being the figure … even if the display market for these publications grew at 15% for the next 10 years the total revenue pie for them would be just over $300m. That’s based off 15% annual growth EVERY YEAR for the next 10 years.

Even if newspapers declined at 15% YOY for the same period (which is doubtful considering their track record over the last 10 years) their metro revenue exc. classifieds in 2019 would be around $314m

So newspapers now are commercially very viable, with steady readership, sales and advertising dollars. They absolutely dwarf their online cousins in a business sense.

So why do their owners seem so determined to kill them? And why are they offering pretty much all their print content online, for free?

Maybe Murdoch is looking at charging as he’s done similar numbers and seen there is really no upside as it currently stands for migrating his perfectly profitable print readers online. He’s seen he could turn a display ad business that is worth almost $2b into something that could potentially be worth not much more than $600m a year.

With that in mind … should Fairfax and News shut down their current online papers and offer a basic feed service to users through their a national or state based masthead?

Then they can focus on making their newspapers a better product and trying to revitalise them and protect their content and unique offering? One area I think print newspapers nail that online hasn’t is the curation of content. Organising and presenting content in a compelling way that appeals to the mindset and needs of the reader.

I’m not saying they should shut them down, but it’s worth thinking about especially given all the current debate.

And crazy ideas are sometimes good ones … at least to consider.

Can I repeat, I’m not suggesting they shut them down.

Would you pay for this? Murdoch hack redefines lazy …

Ok a few things upfront (stay with me here) …

1/ There’s a lot of debate around paid content, and Rupert Murdoch believes that people should be paying for news content online

2/ The definition of news is so blurry who knows what it is anymore

3/ Murdoch has called aggregators and sharing sites ‘content kleptomaniacs’ … and has warned they will have to pay the price of co-opting News Ltd content

4/ Murdoch is even pushing pay TV operators to pay a broadcast fee for retransmitting his FTA channels in the US

5/ I believe Newscorp is responsible for some of the worlds best TV, movie and written content and find Rupert Murdoch a fascinating character. I’m not a blah blah Murdoch basher – if anything the guy intrigues me.

So we have that straight. Still with me.

Here’s what News Ltd’s Adelaide Now believe is news

http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,1,26229884-5006301,00.html

It’s titled ‘Drunkest man ever tries to buy booze’.

Hilarious! BTW – I’m not sure this guy is drunk … I think another substance is causing the stumbling and general trouble he is in. Whatever trouble he is in, it would be unfair to not feature this as a news piece that is important to the lives of Adelaide’s citizens.

The video was posted on Break.com … then embedded by the Adelaide Now writer/editor (what do they call themselves now – curator??). The incident didn’t happen in Adelaide. It has no connection at all to Adelaide.

Is this what Murdoch means when he talks about his engaging, original content? A sad, drug addled man walking helplessly around a bottle shop … videoed on CC … ripped from break.com and disguised as news?

Maybe it is and I’m the idiot.

Trouble is. News didn’t create this. They didn’t source it. They’re not hosting it. They haven’t paid for its creation or distribution.

However, they are charging advertisers to advertise around it and making revenue as a result. They are profiting from someone else’s work and investment. Personally I think the video is complete sh*t and scraping the very bottom of the barrel, but that’s my opinion … the bigger issue is the hypocrisy.

Now I’m not stupid enough to think Murdoch wrote this story, but I think sometimes when he and his execs are grandstanding that maybe they’re not paying attention to what their own staff are doing. So whilst Rupert is in China crying about the evil Internet making things tough, his journo’s are doing everything he is rallying against.

It’s important to note that News Ltd and its digital properties LOVE embedding YouTube videos in their news articles. Check the hot, but sadly completely irrelevant fake lesbian video action in this must read article about Khloe Kardashian’s (who?) pre-nup with Lakers player Lamar Odom – http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/entertainment/khloe-kardashians-pre-nuptial-demands-from-nba-star-lamar-odom-finalise-marriage-deal/story-e6frewyr-1225788545014

I might be a cynic but I’m not sure this video has been posted to improve the story – I would guess it is to improve page dwell time.

Anyway, YouTube and embedded videos across news.com.au, the punch, perthnow, herald sun etc are nothing new and commonly used.

However isn’t this the same YouTube that is a tapeworm and vampire, part of the group which is robbing News Ltd of what is rightfully there’s by reusing their content!! I really hope Rupert and his gang are sending their cheques to the likes of YouTube, Break and their content partners each day for using their content to sell ads against.

Adelaide Now’s sales pitch on the News Digital Media media centre is debateable …

“AdelaideNow is a portal to everything Adelaide – from the latest breaking news and photos to sport, entertainment, gossip and social pics.”

Really? Really? How is this related to Adelaide? I noticed they’ve left off ’sad, exploitative videos of drug addicts’ in the description.

And the interesting thing (and sad too) is, this was the biggest story for the day on Adelaide Now … closely followed by pictures of Ricki-Lee’s Ralph dominatrix photo shoot at number 2 (another piece of content they didn’t have to pay for – Ralph is owned by ACP). Third is an article that is based on a radio interview on ESPN with Charles Barkley. (ESPN is owned by Disney)

Must be tough creating all this original content online.

Alan Kohler is a smart guy – here’s proof

Regular readers will know I have a bit of a bromance for Alan Kohler.

Business Spectator is great and he is easily the best Business presenter on TV, for my tastes anyway. However, the main reason I think the guy is great is because he writes really bloody good articles.

This one is exceptional and timely considering recent events – http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/The-internet-doesnt-exist-pd20091020-WYRBY?opendocument&src=rss

The internet is merely a delivery mechanism for bits of data. It’s equivalent to the paper on which newspapers are printed or the air through which TV and radio signals are transmitted.

We never called newspaper journalism “paper content” or TV journalism “spectrum content” and the fact that it’s now online is, it seems to me, quite irrelevant.

In fact it is a colossal miscalculation to think that consumers distinguish between stuff they read on paper and the stuff they read on a website, and that they have somehow decided they will pay for one and not the other.

Have a read. It’s a great piece of writing and content, dare I say it, worth paying for.

IAB Board Seat nominations are in, voting underway

Voting closes for IAB members for the rotating IAB Board Seat on October 26.

The opening was created when Tim Johnson, formerly of MCN, resigned from MCN to head to Telstra Media.

5 people have nominated.

Wendy Hogan – MD of CBS Interactive
Robert Leach – Head of MCN Connect
Alex Littlejohn – MD of Adconion
Robert Wong – CEO of Catalog Central
Mark Halstead – MD of 3D Interactive

All the bio info on candidates as well as voting requirements etc are here – http://www.aimia.com.au/enews/IAB/Voting%20Process%20&%20Ballot%20Form%202009-2010.pdf

Two candidates really stand out for me.

Rob Leach is definitely one of the best digital thinkers in the industry and his knowledge of interactive TV is second to none within Australia. Speaking to him about the future convergence of Internet and TV and the connected household is exciting. I think he’d be great and would bring another dimension to the board.

Wendy Hogan would be a great candidate as well. CBS Interactive is a great business with premium products and commercially is very smart and nimble. Wendy is an active contributor within the digital industry in terms of supporting events and discussion around key issues related to not only media, but also technology and media convergence - and has been for years – and this is something that could add a lot to the IAB and bring new perspectives to the table that the foundation members may not bring.

Looking forward to seeing who gets the nod as there’s some great candidates. Personally I would love to see Wendy or Rob on that board.

Measuring the frequency of web visits

One question I always have around website traffic is ‘how many of the users’ are regular.

ie – how many can’t live without the content, visit regularly and often, and for how long.

Currently, there’s no audited way to work this out. The closest thing is looking at average visits and page views per user and average time spent per user.

Problem with this is it’s an average figure … it doesn’t take into consideration heavy users, light users or anyone in between.

For digital this is a question we need answering. The consumption of digital media can be incredibly quick … in/out within a minute or less.

Why? Well – search plays a large role for one due to how much traffic it is responsible for across almost websites. Users head to Google with a problem, Google directs them to the page with the info it deems most relevant … and the users generally reads this page and then exits.

Another reason is around the multi-tasking nature of online. Users looking at multiple windows, whilst using tools like Messenger or a Twitter client at the same time.

Lastly, social channels are responsible for increasing amounts of traffic … and like search it’s generally consumed quickly and then the user departs.

One of my views is you can judge the quality of a media brand by the loyalty of its users.

The problem now is EVERYONE claims a loyal userbase. I’ve heard a biz dev pitch for a website that has an average time spent per user of under 2 minutes, which claims it has a highly engaged audience. C’mon …

Now I’m not sure what Nielsen is doing about this. And I don’t know whether Comscore covers it (if anyone from Comscore wants to come in and explain, great) … but Quantcast in the US is doing something cool.

They have a data set that is around ‘Site Frequency’ and they break users into Addicts, Regulars and Passers By.

You can see what % of the total users fit into these 3 groups, and what % of total visits they represent. See below for the info around Hulu.com

As you can see, 50% of the sites users are Passers By … accounting for 8% of visits. 5% addicts account for 57% of visits … and regulars (45%) account for 34% of visits.

As a media person this is interesting data. It helps with planning and it provides some much needed depth to numbers that are generally too big to comprehend (ie 50m users, 5b pageviews etc)

Great info. Really like the look of this Quantcast product.