4. thebuzz
letter from the eDitor
Building Size, Strength, reach
and aptitude
G
rowth by acquisition. That’s how much
of the corporate world—from Facebook,
to AB InBev, to IBM—operates, and the
marketing research industry is no different.
In his 16th-annual Global Top 25 report, Jack
Honomichl discusses how the highest earners in
the global research industry have attained much
of their size and strength through consolidation.
“For the most part, the 25 behemoths of our
industry have come to be so via amalgamation,
the end result of hundreds of acquisitions made
over many years in many countries,” he writes.
“In 2011 alone, Top 25 firms bought 24 research
firms around the world. … The concentration of
power in our industry continues unabated.”
A noteworthy example is Paris-based Ipsos:
Ranked fifth on the 2011 Global Top 25 list,
Ipsos now holds the No. 3 spot after acquiring
Synovate, ranked sixth on last year’s list. Turn to
page 12 to read more of Honomichl’s analysis of
the industry’s movers and shakers.
get mOre
The “strength in numbers” philosophy
applies to many aspects of business, of course.
On page 6, we offer you some tips on what to
consider when building an affiliate marketing
program to help boost your e-commerce sales.
Consider this a primer, a starting point for
your planning process.
And let us know what other marketing
tactics, tools, theories or concepts you’d like
to learn more about in our how-to section.
The Marketing News staff—and the AMA, as a
whole—appreciates your feedback so that we
can deliver the knowledge, insights and tools
that you need.
Best,
Elisabeth A. Sullivan
esullivan@ama.org
marketingpower
tune in to ama tV, an online service that comes to you twice monthly with the
latest in marketing news and trends, as well as career tips and insights from
industry leaders.
Visit marketingPower.com/amatV.
neW ama PODcaSt
neW ama WeBcaSt
AUTHOR SERIES: BRAND REAL
laurence Vincent, branding strategist and author of
Brand Real: How Smart Companies Live Their Brand
Promise and Inspire Fierce Customer Loyalty, takes
it personally when he hears branding described as an
artful mix of wordplay and graphics—or, worse, magic.
During this podcast, Vincent shares a practical approach
to the business of branding.
BEST PRACTICES IN LIST SEGMENTATION
in direct marketing, if you’re not reaching the right
people, your message and call to action will have no
meaning. Being able to easily segment your lists will
enable you to expand your reach and target your
audience with appropriate messages, thus increasing
your response rates. this webcast will teach you the
difference between behavioral and profile segmentation,
how to use personalization to optimize segmentation,
and more.
Visit marketingPower.com/podcasts.
Visit marketingPower.com/webcasts.
4
marketing news | August 31, 2012
AMA083112_INI.indd 4
8/6/12 3:42 PM
5. thebuzz
Career Corner
Career Climbing by the Numbers
Rare is the marketer whose career has not had some
twists and turns. My career path, if plotted on a chart,
would make you dizzy. And yet I can see a pattern
in all of the ups, downs and diversions, and that
is volunteerism.
Many of the pivotal lessons I’ve learned, amazing
people I’ve met and unexpected opportunities I’ve received
have stemmed from my work with the American Marketing
Association. In honor of the AMA’s 75th anniversary,
I thought I’d share some stats and lessons from my own
career trajectory—and the AMA’s role in it.
75
Sima Dahl
(MarketMyCareer.com) is
a recovered job seeker
turned personal branding
and social networking
consultant, trainer and
speaker. Subscribe to
her monthly AMA career
e-newsletter at
MarketingPower.com/
newsletters.
This year marks the AMA’s 75th year of bringing
marketers together to share, learn and grow. Being
a card-carrying member of the AMA looks good on
your LinkedIn profile, but the onus is on you to take
full advantage of all of the benefits that come with it.
Log in to MarketingPower.com today and update your
profile, join one of the online communities, subscribe to
an e-newsletter or two, browse the content library and
sign up for a free webinar or virtual event. The AMA is a
powerhouse of career opportunities, but as I am fond of
saying, “It only works if you work it.”
10
I joined the AMA 13 years ago because I thought it was
high time I got more involved in my industry. The art and
science of marketing were fast evolving with the advent
of new technologies and I needed a smarter way to keep
up. But it took me another three years to find my groove.
After a few false starts, I landed on the business-tobusiness committee and things started to click. I made
friends—always a bonus—but more importantly, I forged
relationships with like-minded people willing to share
their expertise. Many of those early connections are still
very much a part of my network today, ready to take my
call or answer an e-mail. If you’re not yet actively volunteering in your local chapter, I encourage you to step up.
In my experience, the surest way to get the most out of
any association is to first consider what you can give.
6
Six years ago this July, I made a decision that, perhaps
more than any other in the past decade, catapulted my
career to an entirely new level: I joined the board of the
Chicago AMA chapter. I spent two years each leading
the B-to-B division and collegiate relations, and as board
secretary. I learned invaluable life lessons about leading volunteers, managing expectations, and working in
teams that continue to serve me well both personally and
professionally. And I made friendships that have enriched
my life beyond measure. Board members were some of
the first to hire me when I started my own business. They
showed up at my doorstep with care packages when my
mom died. And they have graced my Thanksgiving table
because many have become my extended family.
Looking Ahead
After six years, it’s time to let a new crop of volunteers
take their seats at the boardroom table. I will continue
to write this column, pen the Career Update monthly
e-newsletter, serve as an AMAConnect Ambassador and
support my local chapter.
When you volunteer, your character, competence
and charisma are on display; you have the opportunity
to make an imprint that will last well beyond your years
of service. Eager to climb the ladder of success? Be it
the AMA or other professional association, step up your
involvement. It’s a career move that you can count on. m
Buzz Bit
B-to-B Marketers Missing the
Mark on Demand Gen
80% of B-to-B marketers and salespeople consider their demand-generation
campaigns ineffective, according to a July 2012 survey from Corporate Visions Inc.,
an Incline Village, Nev.-based B-to-B marcom firm with clients such as IBM, Lockheed
Martin and SAP. Of those respondents:
• 37% report that the content isn’t engaging enough.
• 31% attribute the problem to a lack of alignment between marketing and sales.
• 12% blame budget constraints.
• 9% say that there isn’t enough content.
• 8% report a lack of buy-in from execs.
60% of respondents say that their companies’ demand-gen campaigns fail to
adequately address their offerings’ value propositions and instead focus on the offerings’
attributes. Because of that, 65% of the salespeople who responded to the survey admit
that their sales teams use less than half of the demand-gen content produced by their
marketing departments.
Marketing Research Pioneer
In the July 31, 2012, issue of Marketing News, Charles Coolidge Parlin was
misidentified in a photo caption. We regret the error.
August 31, 2012 | MARketing news
AMA083112_INI.indd 5
5
8/7/12 7:58 AM
6. coreconcepts
affiliate marketing
By ChriStine Birkner | Staff Writer
cbirkner@ama.org
the aBCs of affiliate marketing
Boost your e-commerce business with a little help from your friends online. here’s how.
I
n e-commerce as in life, your success
often depends on whom you affiliate
yourself with.
Affiliate marketing is an online marketing tactic by which brands work with other
online content providers to drive traffic and
business to the brands’ sites, and pay the
content providers a commission for any sales
that result. Spending on affiliate marketing
in the United States is expected to reach $4.1
billion in 2014, up from $1.6 billion in 2007,
according to Forrester Research. And as the
Web becomes increasingly interconnected,
it’s likely that this tactic will continue to gain
steam for both B-to-C and B-to-B brands.
Here’s what you should know before building your own affiliate marketing strategy.
what it is
Affiliate marketing connects an online
merchant with an affiliate, a website or blog
that features subject matter associated with
the merchant’s products. Affiliates post the
merchant’s banner ads or text links on their
websites or blogs and when a consumer
clicks on those links and buys the merchant’s
product, the affiliates receive a commission,
usually 5 to 10%, of each sale. Affiliate
marketing also can be used in the same way
to generate leads, with affiliates receiving
commission for each person who engages in
sponsored posts by filling out a Web-based
form with his contact information.
Affiliates most often are grouped in
affiliate networks such as LinkShare,
Commission Junction and Google Affiliate
Network, or in smaller niche networks or
lead-gen-specific networks.
Affiliate marketing allows retailers to
spend less to generate sales or leads than
traditional online advertising, says Greg
Shepard, CEO of Affiliate Traction, a
Santa Cruz, Calif.-based affiliate marketing agency. “You only pay when the sale is
made. … On top of that, you only pay for
the sales that came through [and] you pay
30 days after the sale. Affiliate marketing …
frees up more money for advertising.”
How it’s Used
While many referral-based e-marketing tactics
suit brands of all sizes, affiliate marketing is
best suited to well-established brands because
it can require considerable planning and
resources to ensure proper execution and
oversight, experts say. Here are some tips:
1. Build Your Business Model First Retail-
ers shouldn’t start an affiliate program until
they’ve accumulated $1 million or more
in sales, says Robert Glazer, founder and
managing director of Acceleration
Partners, a Needham, Mass.-based agency
that runs affiliate marketing programs for
6
One Kings Lane, Shutterfly, Tiny Prints and
others. “Affiliates want to be associated with
a brand that has traction. If you’re still figuring out your product and your business
model and pricing, you really want to be
testing that before you work with [affiliates]
because if you don’t perform, they’re not
going to stay with you.”
It’s also wise to develop your aptitude for
strategizing and tracking digital marketing
efforts, in general, before building an affiliate program, says Scott Langdon, managing partner at HigherVisibility, a Memphis,
Tenn.-based firm specializing in affiliate marketing. “Most of the people who
come to us … have already worked on
other channels such as SEO and pay-perclick, and they’ve kind of exhausted those
channels. They have to have great internal
controls and tracking to be able to attribute
sales to a specific affiliate.”
2. Choose Your Network Wisely Care-
fully consider which affiliates to work with.
“To be successful in the market, the affiliate
network has to have pockets deep enough
to manage that cash flow cycle. A lot of
these smaller networks that pop up all the
time don’t,” says Peter Wilson, CEO of St.
Louis-based LashBack, an e-mail compliance solutions provider that works with
affiliate networks and online advertisers.
3. Build Relationships The most successful
affiliate marketers have solid relationships
with their affiliates and pay them on time,
Langdon says. “[Affiliates] need to feel confident that those sales are getting tracked and
attributed back to them or they’re not really
going to promote your product. … The
quicker they receive the return on their end,
the more likely they’re going to be to push
[your] products.”
Also, be consistent with your affiliate
program, Wilson says. “You’ve got to have a
sustained, consistent approach to affiliate
marketing. If you just put your toe in it and
leave, it’s very difficult to get the strongest
[affiliates] to pay attention to the brand.”
4. Beware of Fraud “Open your eyes and
understand where and how all of your
affiliates are generating traffic,” Glazer says.
“If you’re a shoe site, look at the affiliate
and say, ‘Is this affiliate doing shoe stuff and
shopping stuff or do I have no idea what
their site is?’ This is an industry where,
when there’s always smoke, there’s fire. The
basic premise of ‘Who are my affiliates and
what are they doing?’ is the best defense.”
Conduct weekly and daily checks on
affiliates that are driving a large amount of
clicks without conversions or sales, which
could be a red flag that the affiliate is less
than legit.
Adds Wilson: “Try to find partners that
have been around for a long time, that have
a good reputation. It may not be the fastest way to make money, but it’s the way to
make money to build a sustainable business
in the space.”
How it’s Used well
Glazer’s Acceleration Partners works with
Sunnyvale, Calif.-based stationery retailer Tiny
Prints Inc. on its affiliate marketing program,
which includes marketing messages on
shopping sites, “mommy blogs,” and websites
dedicated to party supplies and weddings.
“The program has grown 100% in revenue
for the last five years,” Glazer says. The Tiny
Prints program also won the Affiliate Summit
Pinnacle Award for exceptional merchant
in 2012, the industry’s equivalent of affiliate
program of the year. “We won it over Amazon
and Overstock, programs that are 10 times
larger, which validated our focus on quality
and doing a good job communicating with
our affiliates, and knowing them and understanding them,” Glazer says. m
marketing news | August 31, 2012
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8. problemsolved
caSe StuDy
By molly Soat | Staff Writer
msoat@ama.org
turning the tide
P&g’s clothes-cleaning champ embraces viral and turns satire into a solution
the Problem
Making a 70-year-old brand of any kind
seem hip and social is no easy feat. But
making a 70-year-old brand associated
with dirty socks seem hip and social is
even trickier.
Procter & Gamble got an assist in its
efforts to create some digital traction for
its Tide detergent line on May 29 when
The Onion, a satirical newspaper based in
Chicago, ran a fictional article penned by
a hypothetical Tide social media director titled, “Hey, Everybody! This Cool New
Tide Detergent Video Is Blowing Up All
Over the Internet!” The article pokes fun at
marketers’ attempts to create viral videos in
order to boost brand interest on the Web.
It begins: “Have you seen this awesome
new Web video from Tide detergent? I just
checked it out online and, man, it is easily
one of the coolest digital videos I’ve ever
seen. It’s no wonder this clip is blowing up
all over the Internet! It’s so fun and entertaining, absolutely everyone is discussing
it on popular blogs and linking to it from
social media platforms.”
The video described in the Onion satire
plays on multiple viral video clichés. “It’s
got these cute, funny talking animals, a cool
indie-rock song, and it’s just so hilariously
random. And it’s got this amazing cameo
by Bret Michaels, which is so funny because
Bret Michaels is hilarious and from the ’80s.”
Tide was faced with the task of reacting
to the article—and fast. According to John
Robinson, senior vice president of creative
at Boston-based agency Digitas Inc. and a
consultant on the project, “Relevancy has
a deadline: What people are talking about
one minute can easily change in the next.”
the Fix
Sarah Pasquinucci, a P&G marketer in
charge of the Tide campaign, says: “When
we read the Onion article, to be honest,
our first reaction was we laughed. … It was
cleverly written to really highlight the plight
of brands everywhere that are navigating
social media, especially those that might
not have an obvious fit, like detergent.”
The Tide team understood that to capitalize
on the marketing opportunity that the article
created, the brand’s response had to be quick,
and the only way to respond would be to create
the video described in the Onion article.
Pasquinnucci and her colleagues got
to work immediately with Digitas, public
relations agency DeVries PR, and creative
agency Saatchi and Saatchi. Digitas dressed
up one of its employees as 1980s rock star
Bret Michaels. The team hired puppeteers to
animate the “cute, funny talking animals” as
the fictional singer croons an original tune
8
about laundry detergent. The article ran in
The Onion on a Tuesday and Tide posted
the video online on its YouTube channel
and linked it to the company’s Facebook and
Twitter feeds by Friday. (P&G declined to
comment on the project’s budget.)
“Something that’s relevant today is not
necessarily relevant tomorrow or next week
and social media really kind of exacerbates that. This wasn’t a situation that we
really wanted to spend weeks ideating and
vacillating between scenarios, scripts and
different ways to respond. We just knew
we needed to act quickly in order to, kind
of, play into the joke and really have an
impact,” Pasquinnucci says.
metrics
At press time, Tide’s video had attracted
15,518 views on YouTube and 249 “likes”
on Facebook, and garnered the detergent
brand some earned media in trade publications such as MediaPost’s Marketing Daily
e-newsletter. It also earned a nod from The
Onion’s managing editor, Kyle Ryan, who
tweeted, “Well played, Tide, well played.”
Tripp Westbrook, partner and executive creative director at Dallas-based
digital marketing firm Firehouse with
clients including McDonald’s, Saturn,
United Airlines and Mercedes-Benz,
says that playful digital efforts like P&G’s
viral video can help to personalize an
old and established brand like Tide. “I
think it’s great when brands try to engage
with consumers on a different level than
consumers are used to. If done well, it
can put a very human face on a brand
that most people feel is distant and very
corporate,” he says.
The video attracted a following but
failed to hit the viral threshold set by
campaigns such as Old Spice’s “The Man
Your Man Could Smell Like,” which
attracted more than 6 million views in
less than a week in July 2010. While timeliness is vital with such online efforts,
quality and execution should not fall by
the wayside, according to Westbrook. “If
it’s not interesting content, it’s not going
to be seen. … I just find that the execution [of Tide’s video] fell a little flat. It just
wasn’t funny. … With a little over 15,000
hits, I wouldn’t exactly call the video viral.
In many ways, it sort of proves what the
Onion article was trying to make fun of,
unfortunately,” he says.
But according to Digitas’ Robinson,
the small digital splash that the video
made was enough of a sign of success
for the effort. “Seeing how much everyone enjoyed this video and respected the
choice that Tide made in doing it was the
return we wanted.” m
BranD
tide
cOmPany
Procter & gamble
heaDquarterS
cincinnati
Partner agency
Digitas inc.
PrOJect timeline
three days
reSultS
15,518 views on youtube; 249 “likes”
and 28 shares on facebook
marketing news | August 31, 2012
AMA083112_INI.indd 8
8/6/12 3:42 PM
10. viewpoint
Agents of ChAnge
By Jeffrey Hayzlett
jeffreyh@hayzlett.com
Preparing for the Perils of
Brand Mentions
Jeffrey Hayzlett is a global
business consultant and author
of The Mirror Test: Is Your
Business Really Breathing? and
Running the Gauntlet: Essential
Business Lessons to Lead, Drive
Change, and Grow Profits.
Previously, hayzlett was CMo of
Kodak. for more insights from
hayzlett, check out his regular
contributions to AMA tV at
MarketingPower.com/AMAtV, or
follow him on hayzlett.com or at
twitter.com/Jeffreyhayzlett.
10
N
ot all brand mentions are
fact. Indeed, some are pure
fiction.
In a recent episode of AMC’s Mad Men,
the Jaguar brand was depicted in a less-thanoptimal light, involving immoral fictional
Jaguar executives and implying that there
were questions about the reliability of the
product. Executives at any major brand are
always excited when they receive news that
they will be featured on a major television
show, but in this case, Jaguar execs had no
forewarning about the televised appearance
of their brand, let alone what was going to
be said about their company or how it was
going to be used.
Jaguar execs can take solace in the fact
that it was a fictional story. Therefore, they
did not have control and even had some
deniability once they found out that the
episode was not portraying their company
in the best light. What is a brand to do when
this kind of controversy hits?
I was once confronted with this question when someone used the name of our
brand in a rap song, which hit the top of the
charts and received millions of downloads.
Although it was popular, the song contained
vulgar and derogatory words. On one hand,
we were proud that the rap artists used our
brand as an iconic symbol in the song, but
at the same time, who wants to be associated
with a word that is so derogatory and negative that it offends not only our customer
base, but also our own morals and sense of
who we are as a company?
How do marketers prepare themselves
for the questions raised in these situations?
What is your value system and what moral
compass do you use in making your decisions? I was pleased to see Jaguar’s response
to the Mad Men brand inclusion, with the
company rep stating that he was grateful
that the brand was used in the episode and
remained confident that the public would
recognize that Mad Men is a fictional show.
Similarly, I also liked the response from our
team to the rap song inclusion: Some wanted
to promote it, while others wanted to run
from it. In the end, we decided we would
always recognize the use of our brand name
as iconic, yet we would neither condemn
nor endorse the use of our name in a pop
phenomenon. That way, we are able to
take a stand and preserve our integrity
as a company.
It is important for marketers to think
ahead and not only raise the questions
about these kinds of situations, but also
think about their brand language. As marketers, we spend a lot of time thinking about the
way that our companies and brands look and
feel, but also we really need to sit down and
think about the essence of who we are and
what we want to represent. That will filter
into everything that we do, in terms of our
relationships with vendors, our customers
and, most importantly, the promises that we
deliver to our customers.
This process should not be led by just
CMOs. As the leaders of the business, CEOs
have to take a very active role in deciding
about the essence of the brand: where it
needs to go, how it is represented, and how
executives’ professional—and personal—
decisions may have an impact. m
•com
Jeffrey Hayzlett will be presenting at
the 10th-annual Brand ManageCamp
marketing conference, an AMA partner
event, in Las Vegas on Oct. 17-18, 2012.
For more information, visit
MarketingPower.com/events.
We spend a lot of time thinking about the way that our
companies and brands look and feel, but also we really
need to sit down and think about the essence of who
we are and what we want to represent. That will filter
into everything that we do, in terms of our relationships
with vendors, our customers and, most importantly, the
promises that we deliver to our customers.
Marketing news | August 31, 2012
AMA083112_INI.indd 10
8/6/12 5:58 PM
11. Globalization
worldview
By Jim SluSSer
james.slusser@itpreneurs.com
Navigating the Path to Globalization
T
he world may be flat, but the path
to globalization sure isn’t. The
marketing challenges and opportunities that accompany globalization add
a few bumps in the road, and given the
increasing breadth and reach of the
global marketplace, your path is only
getting bumpier.
In my own experience, I’ve worked
from both the client and agency perspective across a range of verticals both
stateside and internationally. And for the
past 18 months, I have headed up global
marketing at ITpreneurs, which delivers
competency development programs
for IT professionals, with a portfolio
offered in 10 different languages and
delivered in 45-plus countries to more
than 50,000 IT professionals. The
diversity of our customer and product
base is matched equally by our employee
base. Our global marketing team of 10
represents eight nationalities and speaks
15 languages.
This global orientation, both internally
and externally, obviously poses unique
cultural and communication challenges,
and it reinforces the base need for a
strong brand promise and well-tailored
customer messaging.
Beyond that, globalization affects every
nook and cranny of your marketing strategy.
So you think you’ve mastered social media
and your Facebook strategy is finally
starting to produce measurable results?
Congratulations. Is your SEO strategy on
Google driving lots of organic traffic to your
site and generating qualified leads? Kudos.
Now what about the 500 million Internet
users in China who don’t use either? Time
to wrap your head around Baidu, Qzone,
Sina Weibo and Renren.
Do you have your traditional display ad
budget and strategy firing on all cylinders?
How nice for you. However, the 121 million
Internet users in India (still a relatively
small proportion of the country’s 1.2 billion
people) are accessing the Web via their
mobile devices. Time to revisit the Hindi
mobile ad campaign, no?
Or as we’ve found out in our IT
training certification process, are you
mailing traditional paper certificates
to your membership or customer base
each year? That’s cute—and potentially a
complete waste of your time and money.
Latin America demands something more
substantial. North America doesn’t really
want or need the paper certificate; digital delivery works just fine, thank you very
much. The paper certificate method still is
relevant in Europe and the Middle East (for
Jim SluSSer is the marketing
director at itpreneurs in
Rotterdam, the netherlands;
serves on the European advisory
board of the CMo Council; and
is past president of the aMa
tampa bay chapter. Follow
Jim on twitter at @jslusser.
This global orientation, both internally and externally,
obviously poses unique cultural and communication
challenges, and it reinforces the base need for a strong
brand promise and well-tailored customer messaging.
now), but getting them delivered—on time
and in good condition—can be a challenge
in other regions (Asia Pacific, I’m talking
to you). The market size and opportunity
is large and exciting, and matched at every
turn with new challenges.
To develop an effective and truly
globally applicable marketing strategy,
you have to consider virtually every
marketing tactic that you employ and
how it will be received by the given
country or target audience. But don’t be
overwhelmed. Instead, consider this an
opportunity to hone your marketing
efforts overall. Let globalization inspire
you. Crave knowledge about your customers. Where do they work, play and live?
How do they use your product or service?
What problem are you helping them to
solve? And just when you think you have
your marketing strategy done and dusted,
it all changes overnight. Stay alert to find
the best routes around the inevitable
obstacles ahead. m
August 31, 2012 | marketiNG News
AMA083112_INI.indd 11
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8/6/12 5:58 PM
13. excluSiVe feature
honomichltop25
The global marketing research industry’s acquired size and strength yield
positive returns amidst a battered global economy
he world’s 25 largest marketing,
advertising and public opinion
research conglomerates, in toto,
saw revenues increase by 4.1% in
2011, with a “real growth” rate of
1.4% after adjustment for inflation.
That, I submit, is good news given
the dire economic conditions in
many countries, as well as civil
unrest and war-like conditions in
many others during the year.
But not all of the Global Top 25 shared in this limp gain:
Nine saw revenues decrease in 2011 or not grow enough
to cover inflation, which was an estimated 2.7%. (This was
calculated by taking the known inflation rates in the U.S.,
15 European Union countries and Japan, which account
for about 75% of the world spend for research services,
weighting them and then assuming that rate applies to the
rest of the world.)
This is especially important because, in aggregate, the
Top 25 had revenues of $18.7 billion in 2001, which is
about 58% of the total world spend for research.
These are the top-line findings from my annual global
industry analysis, now in its 16th year, prepared exclusively
for Marketing News. And, I suggest, it is the best gauge that we
have about how the research industry is faring worldwide.
glass House
For the most part, the 25 behemoths of our industry have
come to be so via amalgamation, the end result of hundreds
of acquisitions made over many years in many countries.
That raises the question of who owns the end result—and
the degree to which the owners make public financial information. Let’s examine that.
Ten of the Top 25 organizations, which account for the
lion’s share of Top 25 revenues, are publicly listed companies
traded on major exchanges in the U.S., the U.K., France,
Germany and Japan, so their financial information is in the
public domain.
Four are subsidiaries of larger public companies and it
is the parent that decides how much financial information
to release on their subsidiaries—and that varies. One might
publish top-line financials but withhold details (such as
profitability). Others make full disclosure or none at all.
For instance, McGraw-Hill, which owns J.D. Power and
Associates (No. 14 on this year’s Top 25 list), does not
publish anything about J.D. Power’s revenue and it had to
be estimated for this analysis.
Three are subsidiaries of non-public corporations and,
fortunately, those Top 25 parents choose to cooperate with
this compilation. Two firms—Video Research in Japan
and Médiamétrie in France—are owned by consortiums of
advertising and media companies in their home countries,
and they cooperate. One Top 25 firm, Westat, is employeeowned and it chooses to cooperate for revenue but provides
no details.
The remaining eight companies are privately held by
institutional investors, private equity firms or company
founders and top executives. All eight provide revenue
data for this analysis.
So in sum, we have a situation where, generally, there
is ample financial information in the public domain to
accurately produce this annual compilation and trend
analysis. But, as it pertains to stock, while many of the
Top 25 are “public,” there is not much “float” on their stock;
most is under tight control of institutional investors or
company founders and key employees.
international sprawl
Most of the Top 25 are truly international. As a group, 55%
of their combined revenues came from operations outside
of their home countries and five have subsidiaries or operations in 64 or more countries. The leader is Nielsen, which
has perched atop this listing since its inception. In 2011,
Nielsen’s $5.4 billion in revenue came in from operations
in 100 countries. One firm, Ipsos in France, earned 91% of
its revenue from outside France. Only three of the Top 25—
Westat in the U.S., and Video Research and Macromill in
Japan—had, for practical purposes, no revenue from outside
of their home countries.
As noted, most of these 25 conglomerates are the end
result of numerous acquisitions over many years. In 2011
alone, Top 25 firms bought 24 research firms around the
world. The individual company profiles that follow include
information on these acquisitions (and two divestitures).
So the concentration of power in our industry continues
unabated. A dramatic example of this occurred in 2011:
Paris-based Ipsos, No. 5 on last year’s list, acquired
Synovate, No. 6 on last year’s list. That moved Ipsos up
to No. 3 on this year’s list with $2.4 billion in revenue.
August 31, 2012 | marketing news
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14. honomichltop25
excluSiVe feature
Most of these 25 conglomerates are the end result of
numerous acquisitions over many years. In 2011 alone,
Top 25 firms bought 24 research firms around the world.
Calculating growth
JaCk honomiChl is founder
of the Inside Research industry
newsletter, a market research
trade publication based in
Barrington, ill.
Since one of the main reasons to compile a “world’s largest” list
is to get a fix on the industry’s financial health, it follows
that how the data are derived is important. Here are the
highlights.
Inclusion on the list is based on revenue—and cooperation.
Most of the firms make a special effort to comply with
requirements and that is because they, too, want to know
the outcome.
As it pertains to individual organizations, their revenue
growth, year to year, is calculated in their home country
currency. But there are adjustments. Some of the organizations have additional revenue from nonresearch activities;
as best as possible, those are eliminated. Also, adjustments
are made for acquired revenue. If a Top 25 organization
made an acquisition or acquisitions during 2011 or 2010,
either the acquired revenue is included in both years
before calculating growth, or eliminated entirely from
the calculation for both years. This is done so as not to
artificially bump industry growth rates with bought
revenue. The same is done with divestitures.
Then, for revenue totals, all company revenues are
converted to U.S. dollars and industry growth is based on
those totals, as noted in the table on page 16.
Participating firms are asked to furnish their number of
full-time employees. For 2011, the total for all Top 25 firms
was 110,235, compared with 103,136 in 2010. That’s a gain
of 6.9% and includes employees at acquired companies.
While the Global Top 25 list is limited to 25 firms, there
are participant changes year to year. For instance, this year
Synovate lost line identity because of its acquisition by
Ipsos. Taking its place was YouGov, a fast-growing British
firm that has made numerous acquisitions outside of the
U.K. in recent years.
Also, IMS Health, the huge U.S.-based healthcare
firm, dropped from No. 3 last year to No. 6 in this
ranking, basically for definitional reasons. IMS, once a
public company, now is owned by private investors. This
ownership uses a more concise definition of “marketing
research” in its financial reports than had been used in prior
years, and that resulted in a smaller research-only revenue
and employee input for the Top 25 listing.
Leaders
Individual firm profiles include information on the top
executives at the Top 25, the leaders of our industry. A
summary shows that they average 55 years of age and the
age range is from 45 to 71. One of the 45s, it turns out, is
Jane Shirley, CEO of London-based Cello Research and
Consulting, the only woman in Global Top 25 history to
head a Top 25 firm.
Company profiles tell you much more about each of the
Top 25 firms—their range of services, geographical sprawl,
top management, etc. Read on. m
Methodology
Since results from this annual analysis are oft quoted in the press, it is especially important that the reader
know exactly how these data are derived, and so this explanation: invitations to market research firms with
estimated annual u.S. revenue of more than $50 million are sent in april of each year requesting revenue
information for the prior year, a company profile of activities and other company metrics. global top 25
rankings are based on home country revenue converted to u.S. dollars using average year exchange rates
provided by the u.S. federal reserve Bank. growth rates from the prior year to the current year for each
firm are based on home country organic percent revenue change, as much as possible, which excludes
year-to-year currency exchange effects and acquisition or divestiture effects. total company revenues are
stated in the company profiles when provided. Verification of revenue is required of each private firm for
ranking by a third party, generally its outside accounting firm. for further information, contact larry gold
at 847-525-0707 or Jack honomichl at 847-382-3246.
eDiToR’s NoTe: In the 2012 Honomichl Top 50 report, the CPI should have been listed as 3.2%, so the
inflation-adjusted growth rate for the Top 50 firms in 2011 is 1.9%. The authors regret the error.
14
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16. honomichltop25
ExCLUSIVE FEATURE
Top 25 Global ReseaRch oRGanizaTions
Rank
2011 2010
Organization
Headquarters
Parent
Country
Website
No. of
Countries With
Subsidiaries/
Branch Offices1
Researchonly
Full-time
Employees4
Global
Research
Revenue2
(US$ Millions)
Percent
Change
From 20103
Revenue
From Outside
Home Country
(US$ Millions)
Percent
of Global
Revenue From
Outside
Home Country
1
1
nielsen holdings
n.V.
New York
U.S.
Nielsen.com
100
35,500
$5,353.0
4.8%
$2,837.0
53.0%
2
2
Kantar*
London &
Fairfield, Conn.
U.K.
Kantar.com
80
21,900
3,331.8
0.8
2,402.4
72.1
3
-
ipsos sa
Paris
France
Ipsos.com
84
16,569
2,495.0
2.9
2,261.2
90.6
-
5
Ipsos SA
Paris
France
Ipsos.com
68
10,307
1,639.1
4.6
1,508.0
92.0
-
6
Synovate
London
U.K.
Ipsos.com
64
6,262
855.9
-0.3
753.2
88.0
4
4
GfK se
Nuremberg
Germany
GfK.com
68
11,457
1,914.0
5.8
1,389.3
72.6
5
7
symphonyiRi
Group inc.
Chicago
U.S.
SymphonyIRI.com
8
3,928
764.2
3.2
298.9
39.1
6
3
iMs health inc.
Parsippany, N.J.
U.S.
IMSHealth.com
74
2,500
750.0
4.5
480.0
64.0
7
8
Westat inc.
Rockville, Md.
U.S.
Westat.com
5
1,947
506.5
11.2
3.1
0.6
8
9
inTaGe inc.**
Tokyo
Japan
Intage.co.jp
4
2,153
459.9
-0.2
15.4
3.3
9
10
arbitron inc.
Columbia, Va.
U.S.
Arbitron.com
3
1,205
422.3
6.4
6.4
1.5
10
11
The npD Group inc.
Port
Washington, N.Y.
U.S.
NPD.com
14
1,256
265.3
9.9
76.4
28.8
11
13
Video Research ltd.**
Tokyo
Japan
VideoR.co.jp
3
392
240.9
3.2
–
–
12
14
ibope Group
Sao Paulo
Brazil
IBOPE.com.br
15
2,797
239.9
4.6
60.2
25.1
13
16
comscore inc.
Reston, Va.
U.S.
comScore.com
22
1,012
232.4
23.5
60.1
25.9
14
12
J.D. power and
associates*
Westlake Village,
Calif.
U.S.
JDPA.com
10
720
228.5
-0.6
73.5
32.2
15
15
icF international inc.
Fairfax, Va.
U.S.
ICFI.com
7
1,200
227.5
13.7
49.6
21.8
16
18
Maritz Research
Fenton, Mo.
U.S.
MaritzResearch.com
5
830
187.5
10.0
29.5
15.7
17
17
harris interactive inc.
New York
U.S.
HarrisInteractive.com
5
566
160.7
-3.7
67.5
42.0
18
20
Macromill inc.
Tokyo
Japan
Macromill.com
3
594
159.7
-1.4
0.2
0.1
19
19
abt sRbi inc.
Cambridge,
Mass.
U.S.
AbtAssociates.com
37
1,264
158.0
22.1
30.6
19.4
20
23
Médiamétrie
Paris
France
Mediametrie.com
1
576
109.6
13.1
14.3
13.0
21
22
oRc international
Princeton, N.J.
U.S.
ORCInternatonal.com
5
438
101.3
0.9
37.0
36.5
22
-
YouGov plc
London
U.K.
YouGov.com
9
445
93.7
12.0
69.8
74.5
23
21
lieberman
Research Worldwide
Los Angeles
U.S.
LRWonline.com
3
390
90.2
-10.5
15.3
17.0
24
24
cello Research &
consulting
London
U.K.
CelloGroup.co.uk
2
351
87.4
1.1
43.3
49.5
25
25
Market strategies
international
Livonia, Mich.
U.S.
MarketStrategies.com
3
245
75.3
-7.3
3.5
4.6
110,235
$18,654.6
4.1%
$10,324.5
55.4%
Total
* Estimated by Top 25 authors.
** For fiscal year ended March 2012.
1 Includes countries that have subsidiaries with an equity interest or branch offices, or both.
2 Total revenues that include nonresearch activities for some companies are significantly higher. This information is given in the individual company profiles.
3 Rate of growth from year to year has been adjusted so as not to include revenue gains or losses from acquisitions or divestitures.
See company profiles for explanation. Rate of growth is based on home country currency and excludes currency exchange effects.
4 Includes some nonresearch employees.
16
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18. honomichltop25
excluSiVe feature
1
nielsen holdings n.V.
Nielsen.com
David L. Calhoun, 55
titLe
CeO
eduCAtiOn
B.s., ACCOunting,
VirginiA POLyteCHniC
institute
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$5,353.0 MiLLiOn*
CHAnge FrOM 2010
+4.8%**
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$2,837.0 MiLLiOn*
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
53.0%*
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
35,500*
Nielsen Holding N.V., incorporated in the Netherlands
and headquartered in New York, was founded in 1923
and sold to a consortium of six private equity firms in
2006. In January 2011, the firm was listed on the New
York Stock Exchange.
Nielsen is a global information and measurement
company that provides a comprehensive understanding of consumers and consumer behavior. It delivers
media and marketing information, analytics and
industry expertise about what consumers buy and
what consumers watch (consumer interaction with
television, online and mobile) on a global and
local basis.
The firm’s information, insights and services help
clients maintain and strengthen their market positions, and identify opportunities for profitable growth.
Nielsen has a presence in approximately 100 countries,
including many developing and emerging markets.
Consumer watch
Nielsen’s Watch segment includes measurement and
analytical services related to TV, online and mobile
devices, and offers viewership data and analytics
primarily to the media and advertising industries.
Its media clients use the data to price their advertising
inventory and maximize the value of their content,
and its advertising clients use the data to plan and
optimize their advertising spending and to better
ensure that their ads reach the intended audiences.
Nielsen provides measurement services across three
screens: TV, online and mobile.
In the United States, Nielsen offers two principal
TV ratings services: measurement of national TV
audiences and measurement of local TV audiences in
all 210 designated local TV markets. In addition to the
U.S., Nielsen measures TV in
28 countries.
Nielsen is a global provider of Internet media and
market research, audience analytics and social media
measurement of the behavior of online audiences for
online publishers, Internet and media companies,
marketers and retailers. It measures and analyzes
consumer-generated media including opinions,
advice, peer-to-peer discussions and shared personal
experiences on more than 100 million blogs, social
networks, user groups and chat boards. Its online
measurement service has a presence in 46 countries.
The firm offers consumer research and independent measurement for telecom and media companies
in the mobile telecommunications industry, including
mobile carriers and device manufacturers. In the
United States, its metrics are an indicator of market
share, customer satisfaction, device share, service
quality, revenue share, content audience and other key
18
performance measures. Nielsen offers mobile
measurement services in 10 countries.
Its cross-platform measurement services provide
information about simultaneous usage of more than
one screen, unduplicated reach, cause and effect
analysis, and program viewing behavior. Nielsen also
provides advertising effectiveness research across
multiple platforms.
Consumer Buy
Nielsen’s Buy segment provides retail transactional
measurement data, consumer behavior information
and analytics primarily to businesses in the consumer
packaged goods industry. This segment is organized
into two areas: Information, which provides retail
scanner and consumer-panel-based measurement, and
Insights, which provides a broad range of analytics.
The Information segment provides measurement
data that is used for measuring sales and market share
in the CPG industry by tracking sales transactions in
retail outlets around the world from either POS data
or audit data. Its database of retail and consumer
information, combined with its analytical capabilities,
helps generate strategic insights for business decisions.
Nielsen conducts consumer panels around the
world that help clients understand consumer purchasing dynamics at the household level, providing insight
into shopper behavior such as trial and repeat
purchase for new products and likely substitutes, as
well as customer segmentation. Its consumer panels
collect data from approximately 240,000 household
panelists across 26 countries that use in-home
scanners to record purchases from each shopping trip.
Data from these panels are processed into databases
and reports for clients to perform analyses.
The Insights segment uses consumer purchasing
information as its foundation to provide a selection of
consumer intelligence and analytical services. It draws
insights from retail and consumer panel measurement
data sets, online behavioral information and a variety
of other proprietary data sets.
Its analytical services are organized into seven
primary categories that follow clients’ business
development processes: growth and demand strategy,
market structure and segmentation, brand and
portfolio management, product innovation services,
pricing and sales modeling, retail marketing strategies
and marketing ROI strategies.
* research only. Worldwide research and
nonresearch revenue in 2011 was $5.5 billion.
** the growth rate includes the 2010 and 2011 revenue for
the 2010 acquisition of glanceguide inc. in the u.s.
and the sale of nielsen edi in the u.s., and excludes
the 2011 acquisitions of neuroFocus inc. in the u.s.,
Marketing Analytics inc. in the u.s., usP Market
intelligence gmbH in germany and MeMBr international Ltd. in Cyprus.
2
kantar
Kantar.com
Eric Salama, 51
titLe
CHAirMAn And CeO
eduCAtiOn
M.sC., BirkBeCk COLLege,
LOndOn
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$3,331.8 MiLLiOn
CHAnge FrOM 2010
+0.8%* **
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$2,402.4 MiLLiOn*
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
72.1%*
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
21,900*
Kantar, based in London and Fairfield, Conn., was founded
in 1993 and is the consumer insights division of WPP plc, a
London-based public company.
Kantar’s research businesses work across the spectrum
of research and consultancy disciplines, offering business
insights at each point of the consumer cycle.
The group now comprises 12 research business
units providing the following worldwide services:
• Added Value (Added-Value.com) focuses on brand development and marketing insight through its Brand
Connections methodology, providing services in the
areas of brand marketing, consumer insight, innovation
and communications. Its services include cultural trend
analysis; portfolio strategy; market segmentation;
mindset mapping and brand portfolio management for
identifying market opportunities; brand positioning;
ethnography and ideation; copy testing; tracking semiotic
audits; and touch-point evaluation.
• IMRB International (IMRBInt.com), based in India but
with multi-country capability, has 11 specialist units that
provide research services including advertising and
promotion, stakeholder and mystery shopping, product
and packaging, B-to-B and industrial, brand, channel and
retail, pricing and strategic. It also offers nine syndicated
services covering the Indian marketplace.
• Kantar Health (KantarHealth.com) specializes in
healthcare primary research and consulting. The group
has seven practice areas: marketing insights; strategic
planning; risk management, safety and surveillance;
stakeholder effectiveness and brand marketing;
health economics and patient outcomes; pricing and
reimbursement; and forecasting and epidemiology.
Kantar Health maintains panels of healthcare
professionals and patients in the U.S. and Europe
who participate in Internet research.
• Kantar Japan (jp.KantarGroup.com) was formed in 2007
by the consolidation of four research business units in
Japan: Research International, Millward Brown, Added
Value and Lightspeed Research. It offers selected services
from each, including branding, ad testing, demand
forecasting, product development and shopper solutions.
• Kantar Media (KantarMedia.com) offers a range of
media insights and audience measurement services.
It serves global advertisers, agencies and media
companies by providing media and consumer research
capabilities through its traditional, social and digital
media monitoring offerings.
• Kantar Operations (KantarOperations.com) is an
internal provider of market research services to the
Kantar units that include face-to-face and telephone
marketing news | August 31, 2012
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19. excluSiVe feature
data collection; scripting, coding, data entry and data
processing; process tools, software and technical
solutions; process optimization; and metrics and
performance measurement.
• Kantar Retail (KantarRetail.com) is focused on
digitally delivered intelligence on retailers and
extending shopper insights and consulting
capabilities. Specialist areas include retailer insights and
trends, organization development and virtual shopping
insights. These areas are supported by
products and services including Kantar
Retail IQ, Shopcom, ShopperGenetics,
Kantar Retail PowerRanking and Richmix.
honomichltop25
* estimated, research only.
** the growth rate excludes the 2010 and 2011
research-only revenue for the 2010 acquisitions of
instore Factor sri in italy in October; retail insights
in Belgium in december; and research and Marketing services Ltd. in nigeria in september, and the
2011 acquisitions of spring Wirtz and Pischkegmbh
in germany in January; Lanka Mr Bureau in sri
Lanka in October; and global Market insite inc. in
the u.s. in september.
• Kantar Worldpanel (KantarWorldpanel.
com) is a global provider of consumer
panels that offer continuous measurement
and analysis of consumer purchasing and
usage behavior. The firm collects and
analyzes data from samples of consumers
using technology matched to the sophistication of local markets, including bar-code
and POS scanners, Internet, SMS text
messaging and diary.
• Lightspeed Research (LightspeedResearch.
com) provides market research services by
building and maintaining online and mobile
panels and associated services including
survey design consultation, sample
management, programming, hosting and
data collection. They range from proprietary
online access panels to specialty panels,
custom panels and mobile surveys.
Lightspeed also provides custom panel
services to address specific client needs.
• Millward Brown (MillwardBrown.com)
provides a full range of qualitative,
quantitative and consulting services
focusing on brands, marketing communications, media and marketing effectiveness.
It works across a wide range of industries
and categories, operating in areas such as
brand strategy and experience; creative
development and campaign evaluation;
consumer needs and values; media
planning and strategy; ROI, forecasting
and investment management; brand
valuation and analytics; and demand
and activation.
• The Futures Co. (TheFuturesCompany.
com) monitors what influences consumer
values and attitudes to identify current and
future trends, and offers trends and futures
consulting, and future-facing qualitative
and quantitative research. Its work covers
the categories of brand, category, company,
consumer and macro futures.
• TNS (TNSglobal.com), and TNS/Research
International in selected markets, is a
provider of both custom market research
services and qualitative research services
providing marketing knowledge and
insights into consumers and markets. It has
experience in most major sectors, particularly automotive, consumer, finance,
technology, political and social. The firm’s
practice areas are: stakeholder management, brand and communications, product
development and innovation, retail and
shopper, qualitative, and digital.
August 31, 2012 | marketing news
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20. honomichltop25
excluSiVe feature
• Ipsos Observer (Ipsos.com/Observer) is the firm’s survey
3
management, data collection and data delivery specialization
serving researchers who have the means to analyze data
in-house. From creating surveys to delivering data, its team
of market research professionals manage projects across a
broad range of online and offline research methodologies
including online, telephone, face-to-face and mobile.
ipsos Sa
Ipsos.com
Didier Truchot, 65
titLe
CHAirMAn And CeO
eduCAtiOn
eCOnOMiCs, PAntHéOnsOrBOnne, FrAnCe
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$2,495.0 MiLLiOn
CHAnge FrOM 2010
+2.9%*
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$2,261.2 MiLLiOn
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
90.6%
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
16,569
Ipsos SA, in Paris, was founded in 1975 and listed on the
Paris Stock Exchange in July 1999. In October 2011, Ipsos SA
acquired Synovate.
Ipsos is a global market research firm that is organized
around six areas of specialization: advertising, marketing,
media, opinion and customer relationship management
research, along with data collection and processing. The
firm’s researchers assess market potential, interpret market
trends, develop and build brands, test advertising, study
audience responses to various media and measure public
opinion around the globe.
Ipsos’ six areas of specialization are represented
by the following:
• Ipsos ASI (Ipsos.com/ASI) is a global provider specializing
in advertising and brand communications. It offers a full
range of advertising research services that employs measures
predictive of in-market performance. All stages of the
advertising development process are offered, from concept
development to production to final execution and into
post-implementation performance.
• Ipsos Marketing (Ipsos.com/marketing) is organized around
four global practices: Ipsos InnoQuest, the innovation and
forecasting specialists; Ipsos MUM, market understanding
and measurement specialists; Ipsos Healthcare, the
healthcare research specialists; and Ipsos UU, the qualitative
research specialists. It offers contractual models to better
manage market research money, distributes insights in real
time within clients organizations by leveraging technology
and workshops, and integrates knowledge by combining
various sources of insights.
• Ipsos Public Affairs (Ipsos.com/public-affairs) are social
research and corporate reputation specialists, a non-partisan,
objective, survey-based research practice made up of
seasoned professionals. It conducts research on public policy
issues, and on the attitudes and behaviors of citizens and
consumers. It also conducts public opinion research and elite
stakeholder, corporate and media opinion research.
• Ipsos MediaCT (Ipsos.com/mediaCT) covers content,
telecom and technology. Its experience includes audience
measurement, content research, data analytics, consumer
behavior, and help with monetization and innovation
strategies. The staff combine research skills with a focus
on business fundamentals to help maximize their return
on investment.
• Ipsos Loyalty (Ipsos.com/loyalty) provides customer
experience, satisfaction and loyalty research globally.
It measures, models and manages customer and employee
relationships.
20
* the growth rate excludes the 2010 and 2011 revenue
from the 2010 ipsos acquisitions of OtX in the united
states in January and APeMe in Portugal in January,
the 2010 synovate acquisitions of Firm united Healthcare Ltd. in the netherlands in May and COMCOn in
russia in december, and the 2011 ipsos acquisitions of
espace tV in January in France, tMg Customer
research in Panama in March, synovate in France in
October, and Consumer Behavior & insight in Vietnam
in december.
4
Gfk Se
• Consumer Panels: GfK provides continuous audits and
analyses of consumer purchasing decisions and behavior
for most fast-moving consumer goods, as well as numerous consumer durables and services. Reports are based on
continuous data collection and analyses of the purchasing
behavior of consumers that reveal a range of insights, standard measures of product and brand consumption, buyer
groups for a manufacturer’s own products and those of the
competition, brand loyalty and store preference, and the
effect of price changes, promotion and advertising activities.
• Geomarketing: This service addresses the questions of
customer location, target groups and new sales potentials,
providing a basis for all location-related decisions in sales,
marketing, expansion and controlling.
• Market Opportunities and Innovation: GfK uses
innovation and segmentation, and adherence to best practices, to help develop and refine ideas, whether for new
products, new touch points, new targets or channels, or a
more prominent positioning. Sizing and
validating ideas before launch enables sequencing of
the pipeline for optimal market traction.
• Mystery Shopping: This offering measures the way that
Gfk.com
Matthias Hartmann, 46
titLe
CeO OF gFk se
eduCAtiOn
B.A., inFOrMAtiOn
teCHnOLOgy, uniVersity
OF COOPerAtiVe eduCAtiOn, stuttgArt, gerMAny
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$1,914.0 MiLLiOn
CHAnge FrOM 2010
+5.8%*
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$1,389.3 MiLLiOn
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
72.6%
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
11,457
GfK SE, a public company based in Nuremberg,
Germany, was established in 1934 and is listed on
the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.
GfK is one of the world’s leading market research
companies, working to discover new insights into the way
people live, think and shop in more than 100 countries. Its
focus is on innovating, using technologies and methodologies
to provide a clear understanding of consumers.
The firm delivers services in all major consumer, pharmaceutical, media and service sector market segments. Services
are divided into two sectors, Consumer Choices and
Consumer Experiences. Consumer Choices’ business focuses
on market sizing, currency, and convergent media and sales
channels. Consumer Experiences’ business explores consumers’ attitudes, focusing on consumers perceptions of the world
and the way that they experience it.
These services are delivered in the following
practice areas:
• Audience Measurement & Insights: GfK provides TV and
radio audience measurement currencies throughout Europe
and the print currency in the U.S. It provides ROI metrics,
needed for cross-media campaigns across traditional, digital and mobile media. Measurement includes engagement
with content on TV, mobile, social media, online, in print
and more.
• Brand and Customer Experience: This global area is focused
on brand, communication, satisfaction and loyalty research.
Measurement includes brand affinity, acquisition, retention
and repeat purchase using 12 social neuroscience, digital
sciences and ROI models. The firm targets sensorial, intuitive, emotional, social and deliberative dimensions of how
people experience brands.
people experience products and services across every point
of contact, revealing how employees are interacting with
customers; where and how products are recommended; and
how companies comply with service standards, and distribute and price their products; and provides reports on store
environments and point-of-sale communications. The
service benchmarks a company’s performance vs. competitors, and provides ROI and recommended actions for
increasing customer ratings.
• Product Catalogs: GfK is a provider of digital and office
supply products, with data on more than 7 million products from 20,000 manufacturers in 30 countries and 20
languages. The data is used by retailers, Internet portals and
online shops, and by distributors and manufacturers for
their websites, price labels and
product range optimization.
• Promotion & Retail Monitoring: The firm provides causal
analysis and reporting for technical consumer goods
markets in more than 60 countries, analyzing the shelf, print
ads and Web share, as well as the presence of goods and
brands in the market.
• Retail Sales Tracking: GfK provides retail point-of-sale
reporting and technology market intelligence, revealing
when, where and for how much items are sold, providing
currencies for brands and assortment guides for resellers. It
brings together point-of-sale and external data on ad spend,
consumer sentiment, shipments and economic indicators for
business issues and forecasts future demand.
• Shopper & Retail Strategy: An experienced GfK team
provides insights, strategic consulting and activation through
point of sale. Supported by a range of services, the firm
works closely with manufacturers and retailers to activate
insights and optimize channel strategy, merchandising
strategy and the overall shopping experience.
• Trends and Forecasting: The firm forecasts product sales and
market demand to identify future sales opportunities and
consumer trends, and create new market opportunities.
* the growth rate excludes 2010 and 2011 revenue from
the 2010 acquisitions of Agricultural information
services in the united kingdom in April and interscope
LLC in the united states in november, and the 2011
acquisitions of sirValuse Consulting gmbH in germany
in January and MarketWise Ltd. in thailand in June.
marketing news | August 31, 2012
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5
Symphonyiri Group inc.
SymphonyIRI.com
Andrew Appel, 47
titLe
President And CeO
eduCAtiOn
M.B.A, uniVersity
OF CHiCAgO
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
Symphony Consumer & Shopper Marketing offers CPG
and retailers a range of services focusing on delivering consumer and shopper insights, test marketing
services, digital media services, shopper segmentation
and targeting, and shopper marketing services. These
39.1%
eMPLOyees
WOrLdWide
symphony solutions & services
$298.9 MiLLiOn
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
provides insights through an integrated view of the
beverage alcohol and tobacco industry. The retail tracking products and analytics are scaled to specifically meet
the beverage alcohol and tobacco industry needs, providing manufacturers and distributors with retail sales
+3.2%
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
• Beverage Alcohol and Tobacco Industry Insights: SIRI
trends, and purchase behavior and consumer insights in
grocery, drug, mass merchandise, convenience, liquor
and club stores.
$764.2 MiLLiOn
CHAnge FrOM 2010
marketplace. It offers a suite of retail tracking, consumer
panel and analytics-driven products and services under
the RxPulse brand.
honomichltop25
3,928
SymphonyIRI Group Inc. (SIRI), based in
Chicago, was founded in 1979 and became a
public company in 1983. It was acquired in
2003 by Symphony Technology Group and
then in 2011 by New Mountain Capital LLC, a
private company and majority shareholder.
SIRI is a worldwide provider of information, analytics, business intelligence and
consulting services supported by technology
platforms and experienced teams for
transforming insight into impact.
The firm offers the SIRI Partner
Ecosystem that leverages the skill sets of its
retail tracking and panel staff to provide “one
answer” to business issues for more than 25
clients with regional and global agreements.
SIRI operates in 58 countries through
stand-alone operations, wholly owned
subsidiaries, partnerships and alliances.
It operates under two interconnected
business segments:
SIRI Market Measurement provides CPG
and retail market tracking information and
insights via access and visualization tools.
This information is used to analyze shopper
activity and create new products, as well as
for packaging, pricing, promotion and
merchandising strategies.
• InfoScan Tracking: The census-based
InfoScan point-of-sale (POS) tracking
service provides access to detailed
information on sales, share, distribution,
pricing and promotion across a wide
variety of retail channels and accounts.
• AllScan Convenience Store Tracking: The
AllScan tracking service provides scannerbased POS data across the entire convenience
channel, using data from more than 15,000
sample convenience stores.
Industry Vertical Solutions offers vertical experience and customized products
and services for multiple industry verticals,
including healthcare and wellness, center
store, confections, beer, wine, spirits, tobacco,
bakery and dairy. These include:
• Healthcare Insights: The firm’s Healthcare
Solutions Group provides pharmaceutical,
healthcare and CPG companies and retailers
with consumer intelligence, targeting
and analytic services for the healthcare
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services are delivered on the SIRI Liquid Data technology
platform and supported by experienced teams.
SIRI’s Consumer & Shopper Marketing capabilities
include market structure and consulting, brand and
retailer loyalty analyses, attitudinal segmentations and
individual user profiles.
In 2011, SIRI announced a new relationship supporting
Wal-Mart’s customer-centric initiatives whereby the
two companies introduced a Web-based shopper insights
and collaborative planning platform, Customer Advantage.
It provides a dedicated shopper insights portal of
user-friendly, customizable reports shared between
Wal-Mart and its supplier partners.
The firm offers a series of new digital media services that
integrates SIRI’s Consumer Network (panel) purchase data,
predictive modeling techniques and analytical experience
with a number of online research and advertising capabilities through a series of partnerships to provide consumer
insights, segmentation, targeting and campaign-specific
ROI analysis capabilities for online advertisers.
Symphony Advantage
Symphony Advantage is a suite of business intelligence
software services for trade management, merchandizing,
shopper marketing and in-store execution powered by
the Liquid Data technology platform. It is delivered by an
Advantage Portfolio of business applications that include:
• Brand Advantage is a user-friendly online media
planning and analytical application that is delivered
over the Web.
• Consumer & Shopper Insights Advantage provides insights
into shopper behavior combining content, such as built-in
scorecards and best-practice analysis templates.
• Market Advantage identifies emerging trends and growth
drivers (e.g., health and wellness) before the competition
and elevates their retailer partnerships from “category”
captain to “aisle” or “department” champion.
• Price & Trade Advantage gives insight on price sensitivities,
gaps, thresholds, competitive implications and sales volume
decomposition.
Symphony Analytics
Symphony Analytics provides a combination of predictive analytical techniques, proprietary rapid-modeling
platforms, automated services and experienced analytics
consulting talent. It focuses on the strategic and operational
needs in sales and category management, marketing and
brand management, strategy and demand planning.
Symphony Consulting
In 2011, SIRI continued the expansion of its Consulting
and Innovation Practice, delivering advisory services in
sales and marketing for C-level management within the
CPG and retail industries. The group focuses on four key
practice areas: strategic pricing, growth and innovation,
shopper marketing, and customer and channel management. Symphony Consulting is composed of experienced
consultants from top-tier strategy consulting firms who
have successfully completed hundreds of engagements
focused on developing long-term strategic and collaborative relationships.
SIRI has 11 offices throughout the United States
and in the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands,
Germany, Greece, Italy and Spain.
• Consumer Health information provides detailed
6
IMS Health Inc.
IMSHealth.com
Ari Bousbib, 49
TiTle
Chairman and CeO
eduCaTiOn
m.B.a., finanCe, COlumBia
universiTy
2011 WOrldWide
revenue
$750.0 milliOn*
Change frOm 2010
+4.5%* **
revenue OuTside
hOme COunTry
$480.0 milliOn*
frOm OuTside
hOme COunTry
64.0%*
emplOyees WOrldWide
2,500* ***
IMS Health Inc. in Parsippany, N.J., was founded in 1954 and
was acquired by TPG Capital, the Canada Pension Plan
Investment Board and several other investors.
IMS is a leading provider of information services
and technology for the healthcare industry around the world.
The firm draws on its global technology infrastructure and
combination of in-depth analytics, on-shore and off-shore
commercial services, and software platforms to better
understand the performance and value of medicines.
With a presence in more than 100 countries, IMS offers
services to pharmaceutical manufacturers and distributors,
providers, payers, government agencies, policymakers,
researchers and the financial community.
Using predictive modeling and forecasting techniques
with its databases, IMS tracks more than 1.3 million
healthcare products, covering more than 80% of all
pharmaceutical sales transactions worldwide. Its stakeholder
insights—representing patients, prescribers and payers—are
used to develop commercialization plans, select the patient
and physician populations that will derive the greatest clinical
benefits from specific therapies, deliver information about
medicines to prescribers to enhance treatment decisions
for patients, and allocate and measure the effectiveness of
pharmaceutical marketing and sales resources.
IMS’s market research products include:
• Pharmaceutical Audits measure the sale of pharmaceutical
products to pharmacies, supplemented in some countries
by data collected from dispensing physicians, retail chains
and discount stores.
• Prescription Audits contain projected national estimates of
the rate at which drugs move out of the pharmacy and into
the hands of consumers.
• Medical Audits are based on information collected
from panels of practicing office-based physicians and
contain projected national estimates of the number of
consultations for each diagnosed disease with details of
the therapy prescribed.
• Hospital Audits contain data projected to national and
regional estimates, and show the sale of pharmaceutical
products to hospitals by therapeutic class.
• Promotional Audits contain national estimates of
pharmaceutical promotional activities for individual
branded products, including sales force promotion and
journal and mail advertising, based on information
received from panels of physicians and from monitoring
medical journals and direct mail.
• MIDAS is an online, multinational, integrated analytics
22
mArketing newS | augusT 31, 2012
AMA083112_INI.indd 22
technology platform that clients use to assess and analyze
global trends in multiple markets. It provides online access
to pharmaceutical, medical, promotional and chemical data
that IMS compiles.
product movement, market share and pricing
information for over-the-counter, personal care,
patient care and nutritional products.
• Oncology Analyzer audits collect longitudinal patient information regarding the diagnosis and treatment in the critical
area of Oncology across the major pharmaceutical markets.
• Market Research Publications support market assessment,
competitive intelligence and forecasting activities at all
stages of the product lifecycle. They feature analyses on
pharmaceutical companies, countries, markets, therapies
and products.
* research only.
** The growth rate includes the 2010 and 2011
research-only revenue for the 2010 acquisition of
Brogan inc. in Canada in July, and excludes the 2011
revenue for the acquisition of medical and promotional audits of sdi health llC in the united states
in October. Total research and nonresearch revenue
in 2011 was $2,371 million.
*** estimated.
7
Westat Inc.
Westat.com
James E. Smith, 62
TiTle
presidenT and CeO
eduCaTiOn
ph.d., universiTy Of
sOuThern CalifOrnia
2011 WOrldWide
revenue
$506.5 milliOn
Change frOm 2010
+11.2%
revenue OuTside
hOme COunTry:
$3.1 milliOn
frOm OuTside
hOme COunTry:
0.6%
emplOyees WOrldWide
1,947
Westat Inc. in Rockville, Md., is an employee-owned
company founded in 1963.
Westat combines a reputation for high-quality
surveys with a constant effort to innovate and build new
capabilities. Its corporate capabilities include statistical
design and analysis, research methodology, survey
operations, scientific and clinical research, program
evaluation, systems development, and other survey
and information services. The firm’s professional staff
has significant experience in a broad range of subject
and program areas, including health and medical
studies, education, social services, transportation and
environmental protection, among others.
The firm’s clients are the agencies of the U.S. government, as well as businesses, foundations, and state and
local governments. Its projects serve a broad range of
needs: assessing students’ educational achievement,
understanding health and environmental risks, gaining
new knowledge of the causes and treatment of disease,
providing public health communications, evaluating
the performance of social programs, and supporting the
development of policy and regulations in many areas of
government. Westat also performs clinical trials work
for the U.S. government and for pharmaceutical and
biotechnology clients, both domestically and through
its international operations.
Westat continues to expand its methods research and
information dissemination capabilities. The firm operates
a behavioral research facility specializing in Web usability,
along with cognitive research and focus group facilities. It
also manages websites and call centers supporting federal
agencies’ public information programs.
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Westat surveys are increasingly multimodal, often
including in-person, telephone, Web, mail and mobile
device modes. It operates telephone research centers across
the United States, a national network of home-based
telephone interviewers, and a nationwide staff of field data
collectors for in-person and institutional data collection.
To support these large, distributed operations, Westat
maintains an extensive, secure, nationwide multimodal
computer and communications infrastructure.
Its global portfolio includes health and education
projects in more than 60 countries worldwide. Westat
provides extensive experience in a diverse portfolio of
international health research issues, including HIV/AIDS,
TB and other diseases, STDs and nutrition. It has been a
player in global health research for more than 30 years.
Westat has participated in international student
assessment and literacy research since the early 1990s.
It conducts many international education studies and
international adult literacy assessments, with samples
sometimes covering more than 60 countries and including
more than half a million students.
The firm also provides consulting in statistical design
and analysis to statistical organizations and government
agencies throughout the world including in Canada,
Australia, France, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway,
Finland and South Africa.
Westat distributes and provides user training and
support for Blaise, a commercial off-the-shelf software
system for computer-assisted telephone interviewing
and complex survey processing. Blaise was developed by
Statistics Netherlands and is used internationally. Westat
supplemented its WesVar statistical processing software
with the WesDaX module for online data analysis and
tabulations, and other software for data and metadata
dissemination and use.
Westat’s telephone interviewing, field interviewing
and data editing staff averaged about 1,600 during 2011.
It maintains research offices in five U.S. cities and in five
international locations.
8
intaGe inc.
INTAGE.co.jp
Kenji Miyakubi, 53
titLe
President And
rePresentAtiVe direCtOr
eduCAtiOn
eHiMe uniVersity, JAPAn
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$459.9 MiLLiOn*
CHAnge FrOM 2010
-0.2%* **
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$15.4 MiLLiOn*
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
3.3%*
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
2,153*
INTAGE Inc., based in Tokyo,
was founded in 1960 and listed
on the Tokyo Stock Exchange
in November 2001, and was
listed on its First Section as of
March 2009.
INTAGE addresses management strategy and issues
through marketing and business intelligence in consumer
markets, service industries and
healthcare sectors in four areas:
• Marketing Tracking:
INTAGE provides syndicated
data services through its data
delivery systems. Information
details retail sales trends,
consumer buying behaviors,
sales promotion activities
and other market indicators.
Market tracking services
offered include syndicated
POS retail panel services (SRI,
SDI); syndicated consumer
panel services (SCI, SLI,
SCI-personal); syndicated
promotion effectiveness
measurement panel services
(SPI, IFI); Kitchen Diary;
MR (medical representative)
activities effectiveness
panel service (Rep Track);
integrated marketing research
data delivery systems (Partner
& Brains, RESME); and
Web-based tool for clients
to integrate panel data
(i-Canvas).
• Customized Services: INTAGE
addresses needs for customized
services in management,
strategy and strategy
implementation evaluation, and
business process efficiency. The
24
firm leverages technology and systems, as well as marketing
research resources and capabilities, to optimize marketing
activities and business processes via customized research,
global research, Internet-based marketing research, medical
marketing research, eye-tracking survey, MROC survey and
tabulations, and searches research data from Internet and
mail surveys (Lyche-Pro, Lyche-Web).
• Research and Analysis Models: These models include price
and store sales promotion analysis packages (price optimizer,
APRiCOT), and analytical tools and applications (ShelfChoice, brand management tables, brand ROI analysis,
single-source campaign effectiveness analysis).
• Strategic Solutions: INTAGE fuses information tech-
nology, system development capabilities and marketing
intelligence to construct business application systems to
address strategy issues and operating environments. Database services apply data utilization and analysis tools for
decision-making support systems that maximize the value
of existing client information resources. The firm offers
integrated services (INTAGE-CRM, data mining and
customer portfolio management tools), BPR and BPO
services, drug development services (CRO services), SCM
services (supply and demand planning and logistics planning), micro-area marketing applications (AreaManager)
and business application products (Job Hunter).
In 2011, INTAGE and NTTdocomo in Japan established a joint venture, Docomo Insight Marketing Inc., to
develop research and communication services by leveraging
mobile devices such as smartphones where market data will
be accumulated in real time and provides research based
on a variety of information obtained from the smartphone
platform. Also, FTA Research and Consultant in Vietnam
became a consolidated subsidiary of INTAGE to strengthen
its operation base in that country.
* For the fiscal year ended March 2012.
** the growth rate excludes the fiscal year 2011 and fiscal
year 2012 revenue from the acquisition of research
dynamics Co. in Bangkok in June 2011.
9
arbitron inc.
Arbitron.com
William T. Kerr, 71
titLe
President And CeO
eduCAtiOn
M.B.A., HArVArd
Business sCHOOL
2011 WOrLdWide
reVenue
$422.3 MiLLiOn
CHAnge FrOM 2010
+6.4%*
reVenue Outside
HOMe COuntry
$6.4 MiLLiOn
FrOM Outside
HOMe COuntry
1.5%
eMPLOyees WOrLdWide
1,205
Arbitron Inc., based in Columbia, Md., was founded in 1949
and in 2001 became a public company listed on the New York
Stock Exchange.
Arbitron is a leading media and marketing research firm
primarily serving radio broadcasters, advertisers, advertising agencies, cable and broadcast TV, retailers, out-of-home
media, online media, mobile media, telecommunications
providers and print media.
Arbitron has four main services:
• Radio Audience Measurement: Arbitron estimates the
size and composition of radio station audiences by
periodically conducting surveys of radio listeners in
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25. excluSiVe feature
approximately 284 U.S. markets. The company uses its
Portable People Meter (PPM) ratings system in 48 of
the top U.S. radio markets and its diary-based system in
the remaining markets.
It also surveys audiences for radio networks and
syndicated programs through its two national ratings
services, RADAR and Nationwide. The RADAR service
provides estimates of national radio audiences and of
audiences to the programs and commercials of more
than 50 separate radio networks.
• Measuring Audiences for Media Other Than Radio:
Arbitron offers services estimating the size and
demographic composition of audiences for media
other than radio, such as smartphones and tablets,
television viewed out-of-home and content distributed
on multiple platforms.
Arbitron Mobile provides custom and syndicated mobile
research panels, plug-and-play mobile media measurement
tools, and software building blocks for smartphone and
tablet measurement to companies in the research, wireless,
Internet, media and marketing industries.
ARB-TV uses the Arbitron PPM service to report
the consumption of broadcast and cable TV in locations
outside of the PPM respondent’s home.
Arbitron Cross Platform services provide a more
complete view of consumers’ interactions among
multiple media. By leveraging the mobility and utility
of its PPM technologies, Arbitron is developing
cross-platform services that can complement existing
data services, offer media greater insight into what
constitutes their total audience and help advertisers
plan how to reach that audience.
• Surveying Consumers in Local Markets: Arbitron
compiles profiles of radio listeners, broadcast TV
and cable television viewers, newspaper readers and
consumers reached by outdoor and out-of-home
advertising displays. These profiles contain detailed
socioeconomic data and information about what
consumers buy, where they shop and what other forms
of media they use. Arbitron provides these measurements in local markets across the United States through
its Scarborough service and through two other services
that conduct ongoing consumer surveys.
• Providing Application Software: Arbitron provides
software applications that give customers access to
media and consumer information from the company
and from other research providers.
Portable People meter service
Arbitron’s PPM technology is capable of measuring
audiences for broadcast and satellite radio, broadcast,
cable and satellite television, Internet audio and video,
and in-store audio and video broadcasts.
Arbitron has commercialized its PPM radio ratings
service in 48 of the largest U.S. radio markets. Arbitron is
gradually deploying the new PPM 360 device, which uses
wireless cellular technology to transmit media exposure
honomichltop25
data directly from the meter to Arbitron.
Cross-Platform media measurement
Arbitron is exploring opportunities to use PPM technology
to measure audiences for many types of media. In September
2011, ESPN signed a new three-year agreement that continues cross-media measurement of the NFL and college football
games broadcast on television and radio.
In February 2011, the Coalition for Innovative Media
Measurement chose Arbitron for a three-screen pilot project to measure consumption of content and advertising across
TV, the Internet and mobile media.
Digital radio
As radio follows its audience onto new digital platforms,
Arbitron is working to expand its measurement services
to include estimates of the audio consumption across all
of radio’s broadcast and digital channels.
The proposed service would offer estimates for overthe-air radio audiences based on PPM ratings, and
audiences for Internet streaming services based on a
combination of PPM ratings for encoded broadcast
streams and server-side measures for both streamed
radio broadcasts and pure-play Internet audio outlets.
arbitron mobile
In July 2011, Arbitron purchased Zokem Oy, a Finlandbased mobile audience measurement company, which
now operates as Arbitron Mobile Oy.
Arbitron Mobile has developed a mobile software
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exclusive feature
meter compatible with most mobile devices offered by
major manufacturers, mobile device operating systems
and wireless service provider protocols. The software
meter can measure consumers’ mobile experiences,
online and offline, and includes the ability to measure the
incidence and duration of software application usage and
methods of processing mobile datasets.
Its customer base includes media measurement
companies, wireless service providers, Internet service
providers, software service providers, wireless device
manufacturers, media content owners, and advertising
agencies and advertisers in countries worldwide.
Outside of the United States, Arbitron has agreements
with media information services companies in specific
countries to use its PPM technology in their audience
ratings services. This includes Kantar Media and BBM
Canada. Its PPM technology currently is being used for
media ratings in seven countries in addition to the U.S.,
with five countries using PPM technology for measuring both television and radio. Kantar Media will use a
new Arbitron electronic radio measurement service in
Sweden beginning in August 2012.
The firm also currently operates a wholly owned
subsidiary in India, which provides software development and testing services.
In addition to its headquarters, Arbitron has five
regional sales offices located in the metropolitan areas
of New York; Atlanta; Chicago; Dallas; and Los
Angeles; and operations offices in Dallas; Birmingham,
Ala.; Espoo, Finland; and Kochi, India.
* The growth rate includes 2010 and 2011 U.S. revenue
from the 2010 acquisition of Integrated Media
Measurement Inc. in June in the U.S. and excludes
revenue from the 2011 acquisition of Zokem Oy in
June in Finland.
10
The NPD Group Inc.
NPD.com
Tod Johnson, 67
TITle
ChaIrMan and CeO
edUCaTIOn
M.S.I.a., CarnegIe
MellOn UnIverSITy
2011 WOrldWIde
revenUe
$265.3 MIllIOn
Change FrOM 2010:
+9.9%*
revenUe OUTSIde
hOMe COUnTry
$76.4 MIllIOn
FrOM OUTSIde
hOMe COUnTry
28.8%
eMplOyeeS WOrldWIde
1,256
The NPD Group Inc. (NPD), based in Port Washington, N.Y.,
is a privately held corporation founded in 1967.
The NPD Group is a group of businesses offering
consumer and retail tracking, custom solutions, advanced
analytics and analyst services for a wide range of industries
that help clients identify high-value opportunities and
measure performance.
Information is available for the following industry sectors:
apparel, appliances, athletic footwear, commercial technology,
consumer technology, displays, fashion accessories, fashion
footwear, food and beverage, foodservice, housewares, home
improvement, home textiles, mobile phones, music, office
supplies, software, solar, sports apparel, toys, video, video
games, watches and jewelry, and wireless accessories.
NPD’s national retail tracking services are based on pointof-sale store movement information collected from more
than 900 retail partners representing about 150,000 doors
worldwide. It also offers market- and store-level tracking and
advanced analytics at various geographic levels, including
designated market areas, census regions and custom areas
such as client retail trading areas in the United States and
Europe. LGI International, an NPD Group company, tracks
fine watches and branded jewelry. The firm’s consumer
tracking services in the U.S. are based on information
collected from the NPD Online Panel of nearly 2 million
registered members. Due to NPD’s extensive experience in
managing panels and its emphasis on continuous tracking,
the NPD Online Panel is optimized for tracking studies.
NPD also offers custom research services and analytics
that complement NPD’s data assets. Its solution-oriented
product portfolio addresses opportunity identification,
pricing, marketing evaluation, assortment planning, new
products and forecasting.
The firm’s analyst businesses are concentrated in the
technology sector, providing trend information, forecasts
and analyses developed by a global team of experienced
analysts with extensive industry knowledge and resources.
NPD DisplaySearch provides market research on the
flat-panel display supply chain. NPD Solarbuzz offers
analysis on the emerging photovoltaic/solar cell industries.
NPD In-Stat analyzes the mobile Internet and digital
entertainment ecosystems.
In Canada, NPD offers POS and consumer panel
information on the entertainment, fashion, food,
26
technology, video games and wireless industries. In
Mexico and Brazil, NPD serves the technology and sports
industries, respectively.
In Europe, NPD offers information for the beauty, food,
sports and toys industry sectors. Tracking services are
provided in 12 European countries and are composed of
both consumer and retail tracking services.
In Asia Pacific, NPD offers tracking services for food,
toys, video games and sports. Services are available in
Japan, China, Australia and New Zealand. Services also are
available in China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan through NPD
DisplaySearch.
NPD continued to develop its analyst business in
2011 with the launch of Connected Intelligence, a suite
of NPD products offering analysis on the connected
world, covering devices, content and services. It signed
an agreement with Sam’s Club and SamsClub.com to
receive point-of-sale information.
In early 2012, NPD signed an agreement with
Wal-Mart to receive additional point-of-sale
information from Wal-Mart and Walmart.com.
DecisionKey, NPD’s new Web-based tool for data
delivery and manipulation, will be rolled out to
clients throughout the year.
NPD has 27 offices in 14 countries worldwide.
* The growth rate excludes 2010 and 2011 revenue from
the U.S. acquisitions of Solarbuzz in March 2010, lgI
network in May 2010 and In-Stat in January 2011.
11
Video Research Ltd.
VideoR.co.jp
Soichi Akiyama, 62
TITle
preSIdenT and CeO
edUCaTIOn
B.a., FaCUlTy OF leTTerS,
TOkyO UnIverSITy. TOkyO.
2011 WOrldWIde
revenUe
$240.9 MIllIOn*
Change FrOM 2010
+3.2%*
eMplOyeeS WOrldWIde
392
Video Research Ltd. (VR), based in Tokyo, was founded in
1962 by a consortium of Japanese broadcasting companies,
major advertising agencies and advertisers.
VR is a media and marketing research firm whose major
clients are in the broadcasting, advertising and CPG industries. It is the only firm providing advertising statistics for six
major media in Japan, including four major media plus transit media and the Internet. Several data sources are from its
alliance companies.
VR’s main service is TV audience measurement (TAM).
It is based on a sample of 6,600 households equipped with set
meters for household TV ratings in 27 markets throughout
Japan. In the Kanto (including Tokyo) and Kansai (including Osaka) markets, VR reports both household and individual ratings using the VR People Meter. The firm has obtained
ISO 9001:2006 certification for its meter-based system as well
as for the diary method used in individual ratings research.
Radio ratings research is conducted in the Tokyo, Osaka
and Nagoya metropolitan areas four to six times per year with
samples of 3,000 per wave.
The firm releases a number of media-related reports:
• The Nationwide Newspaper Readership Survey (J-READ)
gathers and organizes standardized data on newspapers
throughout all 47 prefectures of Japan. This one-week
survey of newspaper browsing is designed to measure
items such as media contact, lifestyle, consciousness and
product use to shed more light on how advertisements’
target readers interact with newspapers.
marketing news | aUgUST 31, 2012
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