Healthcare

The average tenure for CMOs of leading US consumer brand companies reached 45 months in 2012, continuing a steady rise from a low of 23.2 months in 2006, according to study results from Spencer Stuart. The researchers attribute the trend to CMOs having "come of age," with the marketing function taking a greater role in enterprise growth due to new technologies and digital marketing channels. Late last year, The CMO Council pronounced 2013 "the year of the marketer," with survey results demonstrating that senior marketers are enjoying budget growth, increased responsibilities, legitimacy, and compensation. Read more »

An analysis of web traffic trends in March shows that lifestyle sites saw an uptick in traffic, with unique visitors to gay and lesbian sites up 40% month-over-month to 11 million, and visitors to religion and spirituality sites increasing by 11%, to 37.5 million. The data, from comScore's Media Metrix [download page], also suggests that Americans looked to the web to solve their allergy problems as Spring beckoned, with the number of visitors to pharmacy sites jumping by 23%, to 8 million. Read more »

Global ad spending grew by 3.2% last year, but some sectors fared better than others, details Nielsen in further results released publicly from its Global AdView Pulse report. At the forefront of spending growth were the telecom and FMCG sectors, boosting expenditures by 7% and 6.8%, respectively. On the other end of the spectrum, spending by durables brands declined by 2.1%, while healthcare companies cut back slightly, by 0.7%. Read more »

Google has released a customer journey to online purchase benchmark tool, providing insights as to where different marketing channels impact the customer journey. Based on transactional data collected from Google Analytics accounts with e-commerce tracking enabled, the tool reveals that in the US, display, social and email each act more as an assist interaction, while paid search acts almost equally as an assist and last interaction. Read more »

Asked which generation they relate most to, only 41% of Gen Xers (born between 1965 and 1976) identified their own generation, according to survey results from MetLife. That's on par with the percentage who, combined, identify with Baby Boomers (28%) and Gen Yers (12%). In fact, respondents were as likely to say they don't like Gen X as a description for their generation as were to say they like it or like it somewhat (49% and 51%, respectively). The researchers suggest that "relating to a generational identity is more influenced by family, values, interests, abilities and personal experience than by age." Read more »

The average email open rate rose to 27.4% in Q4, a slight increase from 27.2% in Q3, and a significant 10.5% gain from Q4 2011's 24.8%, according to [download page] a new report from Epsilon. But click rates continued to lag, unchanged from Q3's 4.5%, but down 13.5 from Q4 2011's 5.2%. A recent report from Experian CheetahMail also found open and click rates to be moving in opposite directions. Read more »

A new study [download page] of 246 companies by the Temkin Group finds that 37% achieved an "excellent" (4%) or "good" (33%) rating on the Temkin Experience Rating scale, a 9% point increase from last year, and a 21% point jump from 2011. To quantify customer experience, the researchers asked consumers to rate companies on a 7-point scale across the functional, accessible, and emotional aspects of their experiences. Read more »

The share of email opens occurring on a mobile device keeps growing, climbing to 41% in the second half (H2) of 2012 from 36% in H1, per the latest report [pdf] from Knotice. Mobile phones accounted for 29% of all opens, up from 26% in H1, while 12% of opens occurred on a tablet, up from slightly less than 11%. Given the rapid growth in mobile email opens, Knotice projects that more than half of total opens will occur on a mobile device by year-end. Read more »

Radio revenues edged up 1% in 2012, finishing the year at $16.5 billion, and marking the 3rd consecutive year of growth, according to [pdf] a report from the Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB). The overall result was buoyed by a 4% year-over-year rise in Q4, the highest growth in the past 8 quarters. Digital continued to record the most rapid growth (11% in Q4; 4% full-year), while spot revenues were up 4% for the quarter and 1% for the year. Read more »

79% of Americans believe that the technology industry has a positive reputation, per results [pdf] from the latest Harris Poll Reputation Quotient (RQ) study. The tech industry continues to get stronger in this area, climbing from 76% rating it positive last year and 75% in 2011. Next on the list, the travel and tourism sector, which follows tech's upward trend, up from 55% rating it as having a positive reputation in 2011 to 61% this year. Read more »