The vast majority (96%) of Americans watch TV in their homes, roughly double the number (48%) who now watch video online, according to [download page] a February 2012 report from Nielsen. Yet the proportion watching TV in their homes fell 0.2% year-over-year, while those watching video on the internet grew 4.9%. Mobile subscribers watching video online in Q3 2011 showed the fastest growth, jumping 37% year-over-year and 5% quarter-over-quarter to reach more than 10% of the population. Read More »

57% of Americans who watch TV say they always notice advertising on the medium, while a further 40% say they sometimes notice ads, according to survey results released in February 2012 by BrandSpark International in partnership with Better Homes and Gardens. Magazines are next, with 30% of readers always noticing ads in this medium, and an additional 56% noticing them sometimes.
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Cable news networks rank as the top source of political campaign information among Americans, with 36% saying they regularly get their political campaign news from this source, ahead of local TV news (32%), network news (26%), the internet (25%), and the local paper (20%), according to [pdf] a survey released in February 2012 by the Pew Research Center. Read More »

Although men and women report equal awareness of QR codes (77%), men who are aware of them are 75% more likely than women to have used one (28% vs. 16%) to access product information, according to survey results released in February 2012 by BrandSpark International, in association with Better Homes and Gardens. Looking at age groups, 18-34-year-olds (85%) display the highest awareness of QR codes, with 30% of those having used one. 35-49-year-olds are next, with 80% having heard of QR codes, and 23% of those respondents having used one.
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2 in 3 consumers say that their basic mobile or cell service is an untouchable item of their budgets, representing a 4.7% increase from 64% who responded that way in 2008, according to a survey conducted in 2011 for STORES Magazine by BIGinsight, released in February 2012. By comparison, 60% of respondents in 2011 said that their basic cable/satellite TV was untouchable, down slightly from 61% in 2008.
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The CPG channel was the leader in online video ad spending in 2011, according to [pdf] statistics from online ad server YuMe released in February 2012, which found that the channel accounted for 24% of spending in 2011 overall and 25% of spending in Q4 2011. Health/Pharma was the number two category in terms of ad spend in 2011, at 16%, although it challenged CPG for top billing in Q4 (23%). Other leading categories were telecom (13% in 2011, including 12% in Q4), financial services (7% in Q4 and 2011 overall), entertainment (6% in 2011, but just 3% in Q4), and retail (5% in 2011, and 6% in Q4). Read More »

75% of US organizations say that competition with social media for recipients’ time and attention is either “very challenging” or “somewhat challenging” to their future success in email, according to [download page] a report released in February 2012 by Econsultancy in partnership with the Email Experience Council of the Direct Marketing Association. Other challenges to email’s success include young people abandoning email as their primary channel (69%), getting the deserved budget and attention (65%), and integrating email with other marketing channels (61%).
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During the three-month average ending December 2011, 47.6% of US mobile subscribers used downloaded applications on their mobile device, up 12% from the three-month average ending September 2011, according to comScore Mobile Metrix data. For the period, downloaded applications remained on par with browsers, which were used by 47.5% of subscribers (up 10.7% from 42.1%).

Texting remained the most common activity, used by 74.3% of US mobile subscribers, up 4.5% from 71.1%.
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2011 saw a 300% growth in barcode scanning compared to 2010, and a 1000% increase over 2009, according to [download page] a report released in February 2012 by Scanbuy. In fact, Q4 2011 alone saw more scans than 2009 and 2010 combined. Mid-November through December proved a significant period of new user activation, serving as the driving force behind the more than 3 million new ScanLife users activated during the quarter, a 360% growth from Q4 2010.
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The average US consumer celebrating Valentine’s Day this year will shell out $126.03 on traditional merchandise, up 8.5% from last year’s $116.21, and marking the highest average in the NRF Valentine’s Day Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey’s 10-year history, according to the February 2012 survey, conducted by BIGinsight.

Total spending for the day is expected to reach $17.6 billion, up 12% from $15.7 billion last year.
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