"Time spent" with magazine ads now more favoured metric

Magazines have more than twice the impact of TV, online or radio and considerably more than printed newspapers in terms of time spent engaged with advertising, according to report done for the Magazine Publishers of America (MPA). The results were reported by MediaDaily News.

The article noted that magazines have been reluctant in the past to use "time spent" as a measure in relation to other media, but are now warming to the idea, probably because it reflects so well on the medium, and is useful in difficult economic times. The metric is based on readers' perception, mind you, rather than their actual behaviour.

The MPA's new "Ad Value Per Minute" analysis reports the relative value of time spent with advertising in the major media. To obtain it, the MPA factored ad impact scores created by consulting firm Deloitte ("State of the Media Democracy" Study, 2008), and incorporated it into a new "Time/Ad Impact Ratio" for the major consumer media.

	Time spent with media* (minutes)	% Share of total time spent	Media influence** (%)	Time-ad impact ratio
Media
Magazines	70	8.9	49	5.51
Newspaper	68	8.6	42	4.88
Internet	154	19.5	48	2.46
Television	302	38.2	88	2.3
Radio	196	24.8	27	1.09

Sources:
* Time Spent with Media on Average Day by User of that Medium, MRI MediaDay, 2008
** % of U.S. Consumers Who Said Advertising in this Medium Has the Most Influence on Their Buying Decisions,
Deloitte "State of the Media Democracy" Study, 2008
Time-Ad Impact Index = Media Influence / Share of Total Time Spent