INSIGHTations: Bits and Bytes from Around the Blogosphere
In this occasional column—INSIGHTations-- learn the latest consumer insights and news
from around the blogosphere. In this issue, learn about the media consumption habits of
today’s “multimedia” children, the state of today’s news business, the need for relevant
listening strategies and a look at the role analyst bloggers are playing for one research
organization. “Multimedia” Children Spend 7 Hours a Day Glued to Electronic Gadgets
Modern parents today have to worry about more than getting their children away from the
TV---there are a whole slew of electronic gadgets consuming kids’ attention these days.
New research has found that children are spending nearly seven hours daily with their
smartphones, iPods, TVs and video games.
The research, Generation M2: Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds conducted by the
Kaiser Family Foundation, revealed that when not in school, children aged 8 through 18
are plugged in to one electronic device or another. Some use more than one device at a
time and consume over 10 hours of electronic content a day.
Only about three in ten young people say they have rules about how much time they can
spend watching TV (28%) or playing video games (30%), and 36% say the same about
using the computer. But when parents do set limits, children spend less time with media:
those with any media rules consume nearly 3 hours less media per day (2:52) than those
with no rules.
The research also found there are substantial differences in children’s media use between
members of various ethnic and racial groups. Black and Hispanic children consume
nearly 4½ hours more media daily (13:00 of total media exposure for Hispanics, 12:59
for Blacks, and 8:36 for Whites). Some of the largest differences are in TV viewing:
Black children spend nearly 6 hours and Hispanics just under 5½ hours, compared to
roughly 3½ hours a day for White youth.

Should Analysts Blog?
Recently, the Twitosphere was—well—all atwitter at rumors that Forrester told its
analysts they were no longer to maintain personal blogs and that the research
organization would aggregate analysts’ posts into Forrester-branded role-based blogs..
In his blog, Augie Ray, a Forrester employee and blogger, notes that Forrester is not
trying to restrict analysts use of blog platforms but instead is planning to roll out new
blogging policies and a new blog platform, on which it is asking its analysts to share their
industry-related insights. Analysts will have their own blogs within the platform, the
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contents of which will be rolled up into appropriate topic categories. The question
remains, however, where is the line between an analyst’s personal branding efforts via a
personal blog and the writing they do on behalf of their company? Who is the owner of
that thought leadership and how should it be shared?

Can You Hear Me New? The Emergence of Formal Listening Strategies
As social media continues to grow as a channel for customer service and customer
relationship management, it will be increasingly important for marketing researchers to
use it as a listening tool. Yet, as Lynne d Johnson, SVP, Social Media for the Advertising
Research Foundation pointed out recently on her blog, listening in the social media world
poses some challenges for researchers: What are we listening for? Who are we listening
to? Where does listening belong? Where is the statistical rigor? How do we allocate
resources to listening?
To help navigate these challenges, the ARF published the ARF Listening Playbook,
where it defines listening as a means for tapping into the naturally occurring
conversations and behavioral signals in social media. As Johnson notes, with the dawn of
online surveys, market research online communities and online research panels, it’s
“important to learn how to integrate the natural flow of unguided, honest conversations
into the traditional world of research. Listening tools that track online buzz or perform
sentiment analysis, can help us capture fact and opinion, just as we would with surveys or
in private communities. We of course have to understand social media better to make this
sort of market research for us.”

Just Two in Five Americans Read a Newspaper Almost Every Day
It’s hardly major news these days that the news business is struggling. A recent Adweek
Media/Harris Poll survey revealed that less than one-quarter of 18-34 year olds read a
paper each day. It appears the days of reading a daily newspaper are coming to an end.
In fact, just two in five U.S. adults say they read a daily newspaper, either online or in
print every day. Just over seven in ten Americans (72%) say they read one at least once a
week while 81% read a daily newspaper at least once a month. One in ten adults (10%)
say they never read a daily newspaper.
One potential business model that newspapers are exploring is charging a monthly fee to
read a daily newspaper's content online. This model, however, seems unlikely to work as
three-quarters of online adults (77%) say they would not be willing to pay anything to
read a newspaper's content online. While some are willing to pay, one in five online
adults (19%) would only pay between $1 and $10 a month for this online content and
only 5% would pay more than $10 a month.
Have some consumer research we should know about? Send us your feedback, ideas and
suggestions to suggestions@ama.org.
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