Women Dominate Online Video Viewing At U.S. Prez Candidates’ Websites

admin — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 15:01:53 +0000

In August, videos at JohnMcCain.com attracted more female than male viewers for the first time, Nielsen Online reported Wednesday.

Women accounted for 58% of all unique video viewers on John McCain’s website last month — up from July and June, when they made up 48% and 37% of unique video viewers on the site.

The increase in women video viewers at JohnMcCain.com came during the same month that McCain selected Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate.

Barack Obama’s website drew consistently large percentages of women video viewers during the summer months, according to Nielsen. In August, 63% of all unique video viewers on BarackObama.com were women.

Candidate Website	Female Unique Viewers June 2008	Female Composition Percentage June 2008	Female Unique Viewers July 2008	Female Composition Percentage July 2008	Female Unique Viewers August 2008	Female Composition Percentage August
BarackObama.com	360,000	67%	181,000	60%	519,000	63%
John McCain 2008	69,000	37%	217,000	48%	276,000	58%
Source: Nielsen Online, VideoCensus (June 1, 2008 – August 31, 2008)

Video streams at BarackObama.com increased 155% in August — up from 502,000 streams in July to 1.3 million last month. During the same time period, the number of unique video viewers on Obama’s site increased 173% — from 302,000 in July to 824,000 in August, the month of the Democratic National Convention.

Video viewing at JohnMcCain.com also showed modest increases in August, according to Nielsen. Video streams grew by 16% over the previous month — from one million streams in July to 1.2 million in August. Meanwhile unique video viewers on McCain’s site increased 5% — from 452,000 viewers in July to 475,000 in August.

CandidateWebsite	June 2008Total Video Streams(in 000s)	July 2008Total Video Streams(in 000s)	August 2008Total Video Streams(in 000s)	% Change
BarackObama.com	967	502	1,278	155%
John McCain 2008	377	1,010	1,176	16%
Source: Nielsen Online, VideoCensus (June 1, 2008 – August 31, 2008)
Note: Data includes progressive downloads and excludes video advertising.

CandidateWebsite	June 2008Unique Video Viewers(in 000s)	July 2008Unique Video Viewers(in 000s)	August 2008Unique Video Viewers(in 000s)	% Change
BarackObama.com	538	302	824	173%
John McCain 2008	187	452	475	5%
Source: Nielsen Online, VideoCensus (June 1, 2008 – August 31, 2008)
Note: Data includes progressive downloads and excludes video advertising.

Most overall online video metrics, including unique video viewers, total video streams, and streams per viewer, were either flat or down slightly from July to August, according to Nielsen. Time spent per person viewing online video increased nearly 8% from July to August.

	Overall Online Video Usage July 2008	Overall Online Video Usage August 2008	% Change
Unique Viewers(in 000s)	119,146	117,916	-1.0%
Total Streams(in 000s)	8,526,733	8,061,706	-5.5%
Streams Per Viewer	71.6	68.4	-4.5%
Time Per Viewer(in minutes)	170.5	183.9	7.8%
Source: Nielsen Online, VideoCensus (June 1, 2008 – August 31, 2008)
Note: Data includes progressive downloads and excludes video advertising.

View the full press release.

Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in Silicon Alley Insider.

Prez Battle Flourishes Online During Political Conventions

admin — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:05:23 +0000

Vice-presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin may be in the headlines, but the chatter in the blogosphere remains focused on the presidential candidates, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain, according to Nielsen Online.

Online Buzz
An analysis by Nielsen of the online discussions around more than 30 speakers at the Democratic and Republican conventions showed Obama leading McCain, followed by Palin and Sen. Hillary Clinton. Vice-presidential candidate, Sen. Joe Biden, rounded out the top five most buzzworthy politicians.

Rank	Speaker	Index
1	Barack Obama	100
2	John McCain	97
3	Sarah Palin	80
4	Hillary Clinton	33
5	Joe Biden	26
6	George W. Bush	12
7	Michelle Obama	12
8	Bill Clinton	11
9	Cindy McCain	5
10	Ted Kennedy	5
11	Nancy Pelosi	4
12	Mitt Romney	4
13	Al Gore	4
14	Joe Lieberman	4
15	Rudy Giuliani	3
16	Fred Thompson	3
17	Mike Huckabee	3
18	Laura Bush	2
19	Jimmy Carter	2
20	Mark Warner	2
Source: The Nielsen Company. Nielsen’s analysis is based on online consumer discussions between August 25 and 29, 2008 for DNC speakers and from Sept. 1 to 5, 2008 for RNC speakers.
Speakers are ranked by online buzz, with the top speaker indexed at 100.

Online Traffic
Web traffic to BarackObama.com increased 32% during the week of the Democratic National Convention. During the same period, traffic to McCain’s website increased 242%, perhaps driven by the announcement, late in the week, of Sarah Palin as his running mate.

Still, traffic to Obama’s site outpaced traffic to McCain’s site by a two-to-one ratio in the week ending August 31.

Site	Unique Audience Week Ending Aug. 24 (000)	Unique Audience Week Ending Aug. 31 (000)	Growth
BarackObama.com	2,617	3,445	32%
JohnMcCain.com	524*	1,791	242%
Source: The Nielsen Company, custom analysis (August 18, 2008 – August 31, 2008)
*This website does not meet minimum sample size standards. Projected and average measures for this site may exhibit large changes as a result.

Online Advertising
John McCain’s campaign increased its online advertising in August, with image-based impressions up by 254% month-over-month and sponsored search links up by 43%.

Barack Obama’s campaign placed fewer online ad impressions during the same time period, reducing image-based impressions by 48% and sponsored links by 18%.

View the full media alert.

Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in TV Week, The Boston Globe, Condé Nast Portfolio, and Silicon Alley Insider.

Nielsen Wire » JohnMcCain.com

Women Dominate Online Video Viewing At U.S. Prez Candidates’ Websites

Prez Battle Flourishes Online During Political Conventions