EXECUTIVE SUMMARY SPEND AND TRENDS REPORT
The All Things Insights Media Insights community completed an extensive survey covering what folks are thinking, how they’re spending and the issues they face. Our Media Insights community is extremely senior-level with nearly every respondent being Director-level or above. So the fact that over two thirds of folks having over 15 years of experience is no surprise. Over half of the group is from organizations with over 1,000 employees. The group looks to be mostly based in the US with a Global remit. More than half of our Media Insights community self-professes that Audience Insights, Consumer Insights, Content Research, Media Insights, Research Strategy and Audience Measurement is part of their job function. It’s clear that research itself and the insights function are supported by management. The fact that the sentiment is growing, is all the more comforting- there’s an not insignificant 7% increase from pre-pandemic times. In terms of the way research execution is changing on the ground- there are mixed results. To see “no more ‘nice to have’ research, only ‘must have’” is a bit concerning. That said, “going from reactive research based on requests to proactive research based on business need” or “even greater focus trying to find and leverage new data sets/new tools” is exactly the direction we should be heading. Survey respondents shared that at this moment in time, Platform is driving campaign planning decisions. We now evolve from the SVOD launchpad to a new S/A VOD / FAST reality. And so, when discussing future campaign planning, Content comes a close and interesting second place. The spectrum of focus for the community seems to bracket between linear and streaming and not extend to Web 3/Metaverse. Overhyped/ Wait and see/Takes time/Interested/Optimistic are all on the spectrum of “I’m not focused on that right now.”
The community unanimously feels that independent measurement is important. The issue is making that feeling an actuality. This is not a new feeling. The need perhaps is more acute. The infrastructure, perhaps not as functional as it has been in the past. There are good suggestions being made in this report, which have been made many times before. The industry has consensus as well as the knowledge of what actions need to be taken. The next step is activating that construct. There was near universal agreement that “only” 56% having a pessimistic economic outlook was actually a positive! Roughly the same percentage of folks were able to ‘remain the same’ with budget now and plan to ‘remain the same’ moving forward- also a positive. The delta between decreasing in budget and decrease in headcount- also a positive. These are difficult and uncertain times, but these particular results seem to showcase a light at the end of the tunnel. There was a fair amount of debate on the direction of spend going from primary towards syndicated data. The fact that the community knows that privacy regulations and policies substantially impact the use and extent of data-driven advertising is not surprising. The fact that over 90% of respondents are focused on adapting is also not surprising. There is absolute consensus on the changes that need to be made. There is absolute consensus that the changes that need to be made cannot be made at present given the current infrastructure of the industry.
Seth Adler All Things Insights
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