A BPA and Nielsen co-branded audit aims to set the standard in Web metrics: the partnership takes another step toward solving the integrated media audit

Circulation Management, Oct, 2008 by Chandra Johnson-Greene

BPA Worldwide announced last month that it has partnered with Nielsen Online to bundle enhanced, real-time Web site traffic measurement with all print and event audits without increasing existing dues and fees.

The new tag-enabled census tool, powered by Nielsen's SiteCensus service, will enable BPA members to access information such as page impressions, unique browsers, users' sessions, unique browser frequency, user session duration, page duration and an executive summary of the above--all on an unlimited basis to retrieve nearly-real time data, 24 hours-a-day, seven days a week. The ability to select by market sector, country of origin of traffic, or specific site also exists.

"Previously, if you did a Web audit with us, you would have to wait one month to six weeks to receive a PDF or printed report, and it wasn't something you could query," Glenn Hansen, president/ CEO, BPA, said at a press conference held in New York. "It absolutely provides value, but in today's here and now that is the Web world, it wasn't going to be satisfactory for the long term. And so out of the think tanks that we held, we found that we needed to look at alternative software that would give near real-time access to what's happening on the Web."

According to John Rockwell, VP, marketing and e-media, Access Intelligence, the partnership is a step in the right direction. "BPA seems to be listening to its customers, both advertisers and publishers," he wrote in an email to CM. "From my quick read of the new auditing options, we'll be able to leverage the power of the BPA circulation statement in a way that gets us much closer to intelligently showing our entire audience. Is it a big enough step? In one way, certainly. BPA seems to be making a fairly aggressive move to partner with a true online 'player,' instead of assuming it can create the whole online audit 'package' itself."

One detail, however, has caused some concern among a few circulators: BPA will filter out spiders, robots and internal users from traffic counts. "Because everyone already has their own [Web metrics] system in place, some publishers' numbers are over-inflated," a b-to-b circulator told CM. "They've already been struggling with that and now they have to go back and say, 'Oh, we now have to start filtering robotic traffic.' They are going to have a tough time."

Hansen says he recognizes the concern and hopes that the partnership will prompt a Web metrics standard. "On the Web analysis we do now, we tell our members that they should expect a 5 to 15 percent drop in the data because there are things we filter out, so yes, there will be some concern, especially for those who have been counting traffic that doesn't apply," Hansen said. "We're following the IAB standard. That's the purpose of doing a beta test--to help us all work through that. And for those members that are doing it on their site for the first time, they'll realize and say 'Okay, we have to set the stage for all the remaining sites.' I think there's a real window of opportunity for [this tool] to come around as the staple."

The source added that although an industry standard is ideal, BPA might not be the organization to set it. "I just don't think people are going to all of sudden recognize BPA as a multi-platform auditor," the source says. "Magazines--both b-to-b and consumer--are not the big players in the eyes of companies like Omniture. The large e-commerce and pure play Web sites are the big players. So why would these companies, who have clients like eBay, follow BPA's standards?"

By the Numbers

Emedia Creeps up on Newsstand Revenues

On average, consumer publishers expect e-media revenue
to generate 8.4 percent of total revenue, compared to
8.6 percent for newsstand sates.

              Consumer Publishers:      Consumer Publishers:
              <$10 million revenues     >$810 million revenues

emedia               9.1%                        6.4%
Newsstand            8.3%                        8.9%

(Publishers generating less than $10 million per year think e-media
will account for 9.1 percent of total revenue compared to 8.3 percent
for the newsstand, while publishers over the $10 million mark expect
to see 5.4 percent of revenues from e-media and 8.9 percent from
newsstand sales.)

Source: Folio: and Readex Research 2008 Consumer CEO Survey

Note: Table made from bar graph.