How consumer habits are reshaping

media choices

Dr. Shail Shri Sharma

How consumer habits are reshaping media choices

 Gone are the days when television and radio could interrupt
your regularly scheduled programming to provide a message
that people actually responded to. Today, the population is
turning to the Internet and mobile outlets for their news and
entertainment, creating a shift in the media paradigm.
 These trends are in part due to generational differences in
media consumption. Millennial’s go-to news channels are a
complete 180 from those of the greatest generation.
Comparing news sources by generation:

 A 2012 few research study reported the following preference for news stories across
four generations.
 The Greatest Generation: This population turns to television first, followed by
newspapers, radio and lastly Internet for news and information. These preferences have
remained steady since 2002.
 Baby Boomers: Boomers also prefer television as their number one news source.
However, they exhibited preference for radio and newspaper until 2004 when
consumption began to decline, and their Internet consumption began to rise. In 2012,
Pew reported that the Internet was just shy of radio and newspaper by a mere 1%.
 Generation X: Keeping with trend, Gen X’s number one news source is also television.
However, a difference of only 3% puts Internet in second place followed by radio and
newspaper in dead last.
 Millennials: Also known as Generation Y, these youngsters are breaking the mold, with
their most popular news source being the Internet. Before 2011, Internet was their
number two preference, just behind television, until they switched places. Radio and
newspaper have been third and fourth preference since 2002.
 These preferences are not surprising for any of the defined
generations; however, things are changing in favor of digital
media across generations. A more recent Pew study reported
in April, 2014 found that 59% of seniors go online and 77%
have a cellphone.1 Also, Boomer’s and Generation Xer’s
preference for the Internet is on the rise.
 This new type of media consumption also creates
opportunity to increase frequency of a marketing messages,
and have multiple points of contact with a target audience.
The Multi-Platform Consumer

 Now we know that the popularity of digital channels are on

the rise, but what platforms are audiences turning to the
most?
 A 2012 study by the Pew Research center showed that 77%
of U.S. adults own a desktop or laptop computer, 44% own a
smartphone and 22% own a tablet.1 The rise in use of mobile
devices means that people are consuming information across
platforms, and to maximize reach, it makes the most sense to
market your products or services on all of them.
 Many consumers own more than one different kind of device,
too, meaning that instead of new technology replacing the
old, the introduction of new devices has created a new multi-
platform consumer. In the same 2012 Pew research study,
25% of participants said they get news on a tablet,
smartphone, desktop and laptop, this being the most popular
among the Millennial generation. In order to stay
competitive, marketers must have their brands where people
are looking—on several different devices.
Keep your message in context

 When delivering your marketing communications across

multiple platforms, it’s important to tailor your message for
each. Multi-platform consumers use their different devices
for specific types of information and uses. To determine how
to market your product or service on each platform, think
about the context in which users choose a specific device.
 Smartphones: People turn to smartphones when they’re
on the go and when they’re at home; however, they only
access the internet on a smartphone for an average of 17
minutes per session. It makes sense to make your messages
quick and shareable when targeting mobile consumers.
 Tablets: Online tablet usage averages about 30 minutes per
session, and is mostly motivated by entertainment while at
home. Marketing for tablet users should be entertainment
driven, containing easy to consume information.
 Laptops and Desktops: Computers are primarily used at home
or in the office for productive, task-oriented activities. This means
that when people are going online on their computers, they are
looking to be informed and to be kept up-to-date. Marketing
messages placed on laptop and desktop media should be useful and
informational, as computer users are online for an average of 39
minutes per session.
 Television: The average time spent watching TV is about 43
minutes per session.While TV is viewed the longest amount of
time per session, viewers might be doing other things during
commercials (looking at their smartphones or tablet for example).
Also, the development of new types of television programming,
such as Netflix and Hulu, has created a shift in the way audiences
consume their television shows and movies.
Choosing the right media mix

 When building the media mix for your next campaign, keep
your target audience in mind.
 What are the media consumption habits for their generation?
 What devices are you likely to find them using and when?
 Are they on multiple devices and how should your messaging
change to fit each of their devices?
 Is the goal to maximize reach or target a niche audience?
 It’s important to think through these questions when placing
your media in today’s new media landscape, and choose the
appropriate tactics for your campaign.
Varied Relationships between
Audiences & Media
 The classic definition of “media audience” is people who
consume the media, in the past, they are readers who reading
newspapers or magazines, and listeners who listening to the
radio. Nowadays, media audience can be viewers who
watching television program of users who surfing on the
internet.
 There are two views of “media audience”, on the one hand,
some discourses note that audience is passive, which means
media dominant audience reactions and feelings. On the
other hand, more researchers believe that the audience is
active and play an important role in affecting media.
 The mass media theory points out that media have ability to
influence people’s attitudes, behaviors and values, for
example the Direct Effect Theory, also labeled as
Hypodermic needle theory.
 The famous “Invaders from Mars”, that is, an American radio
station make up the news of invaders from Mars and made
thousands of residents into emergency situations in 1938.
 The hypodermic needle theory was a theory in the 1940s and
1950s which implied that mass media had a direct and
immediate effect on its audience.
 It supports the implication that media pieces are able to
trigger a specific, desirable response in its target audience by
"injecting" or "shooting" an appropriate message into them.
Another name for this theory is the magic bullet theory,
which instead of using the metaphor of a direct injection
delivered by a syringe, uses the metaphor of a bullet shot by a
gun, in which the bullet is the message intended for the
target audience and the gun is the media outlet.
The convergence of multiple research
traditions
 'Audience reception analysis’ focus on the interpretative
relation between audience and medium, where this relation is
understood within a broadly ethnographic context. It would
be inappropriate to identify any unitary origin for reception
studies, and even dating their starting point depends on how
one identifies the key precedents.