Arbitron has launched a new webcast audience measurement service which gathers audience demographics of individual streaming media channels.
Arbitron has launched a new service, dubbed Webcast Audience Profile, to gather and measure demographic, socio-economic, and Internet usage information. Using a pop-up survey on webcasters’ sites, the service is intended to gather audience demographics of individual streaming media channels without interrupting the webcast programming or content.
The service was given a test-drive by NetRadio, which has for seven consecutive months held the top spot on Arbitron’s Webcast Ratings. During the trial run it was revealed that nearly three quarters (73 percent) of NetRadio’s audience are college graduates or have post-graduate degrees, while roughly one in five (19 percent) live in homes with more than $100,000 annual income. Furthermore, almost one-third (32 percent) of NetRadio’s listeners made 10 or more online purchases in the past year, with the majority (72 percent) spending $100 or more online in the past 12 months. NetRadio’s audience uses the Internet for an average of three hours per day and more than half (55 percent) tune in while at work.
The Arbitron Webcast Audience Profile for NetRadio was conducted in March and April of 2001 through randomly selected listeners of NetRadio’s online audio channels. Each selected participant received a survey on his or her computer with several quick and easy questions. Nearly 4,000 NetRadio listeners participated in this survey.
Bill Rose, general manager and vice president of Arbitron Webcast Services said, “Sellers, planners, and buyers have told us that webcasting’s ability to deliver a targeted message to an upscale, Internet savvy audience is the medium’s most compelling benefit for advertisers today. Therefore, it is crucial for webcasters to have demographic, socio-economic, and Internet usage profiles of their streaming media audience. Arbitron plans to help webcasters, advertisers and agencies understand the value of the webcast audience by providing credible and independent measurement of the qualitative characteristics of online tuning in addition to quantitative measurement.”
