Italians watch TV for longer than any other country in Europe

"Unlike the rest of Europe, Italians actually increased their average daily consumption of broadcast TV in 2014. Following a steep fall in 2007, traditional TV viewing grew by an average of four minutes and 42 seconds per-person per-day between 2008 and 2014 to reach four hours and 20 minutes. If we include online and pay tv viewing figures, the number of hours spent watching video in Italy rises to four hours and 37 minutes per day.
“Continued growth of viewing, in particular linear, can be attributed to Italy’s difficult financial situation, with high unemployment correlating to an increase in TV viewing time on a per-person per-day basis,” Cryan said.
Online viewing times are very low compared to the other countries in the study. “Despite investment, we are not seeing the kind of pick up or adoption in other European countries,” Cryan said."
Source: Report from IHS, reported by Advanced Television, 2nd September 2015

Digital Ad Spend hit €30.7bn in Europe in 2014; Mobile is 17% of display spend

"At the 9th edition of its annual Interact conference IAB Europe today announced that online advertising grew 11.6% to a market value of €30.7bn in 2014.
The AdEx Benchmark research – the definitive guide to the state of the European online advertising market – revealed that online advertising achieved double digit growth for a fifth consecutive year.
All markets participating in the study recorded positive growth and twenty markets grew double-digit. Mobile and video ad spend continued on their strong growth curves and are now a significant proportion of display and search ad spend.
Townsend Feehan, CEO of IAB Europe, commented “The AdEx Benchmark results highlight the importance of digital advertising for growth in Europe’s economy. We need to ensure that digital advertising enables the European digital sector to compete across the world.”
Display, Search and Classifieds
The IAB Europe AdEx Benchmark study splits the online ad market into 3 broad segments: Display, Search and Classifieds and Directories. Growth in these online advertising formats has been underpinned by shifting uses in devices and changing consumption patterns.
Display advertising outperformed other categories with a growth rate of 15.2% and the pace of Display growth further accelerated versus 2013. In 2014, the total value of the Display ad market was €10.9bn.
Search showed growth of 10.8% - and a market value of €14.7 billion. It continues to be the largest online advertising format in terms of revenue, but has recorded a deceleration in its growth rate in the last three years.
The 2014 Classifieds and Directories market grew 5.8% to €4.9bn showing growth of 5.8%. Classifieds & Directories benefitted from the improvement in the economy, but is increasingly challenged by Paid-for-search and Data-driven Display to compete for advertising budgets.
Mobile and video are driving growth 
Mobile now accounts for 17.7% of the display market, with a growth rate of 72.5% compared with 2013.
Online video advertising also showed strong growth, now representing 15.1% of the display market.
Eleni Marouli, a Senior Analyst at IHS and author of the report, “The sustained double-digit growth in online advertising in the last five years demonstrates the continual evolution of the online advertising market. The two formats driving this growth in 2014 were mobile and video. The rise of mobile and video is a reflection of the investment and innovation of the online advertising industry to meet advertiser needs, not just a reaction to shifts in consumption trends”
Regional and national pictures
Daniel Knapp, Director of Advertising Research at IHS Technology and author of the research, said, "Our study shows that even the most mature online advertising markets in Europe sustain double digit growth, clearly indicating the economic vibrancy of the sector. This growth is primarily enabled by the proliferation of intelligent data infrastructures. Data is the growth engine behind advertising that serves as a connective tissue between consumers, media and brands.”
The CEE region grew strongly as online advertising is still benefitting from the improvements in broadband infrastructure and the increase in broadband penetration in these markets, which brings more addressable audiences online. However, growth in European online advertising continues to be driven by the most mature online advertising markets in Europe. This is a direct result of investment in formats and targeting capabilities and developing data strategies in a cross-device environment.
As Europe exits the double-dip recession, advertising markets will benefit from increased optimism from brands. Provided that publishers continue to improve their offerings, online advertising spend is well-placed to be the main beneficiary of the larger advertising budgets. Mobile and video will be the primary areas of interest for these brands.
Top 3 Individual growth markets were:
Slovenia 43.1% growth
Ireland 33.3%.growth
Belarus 32.8%growth
Top 10 Rankings
UK - €8.9bn
Germany – €5.4bn
France - €3.7bn
Italy – €1.9bn
Russia- €1.8bn
Netherlands - €1.5bn
Sweden - €1.0bn
Spain – €0.9bn
Denmark - €0.7bn
Norway - €0.7bn"

Source:  Press release from IAB Europe, 21st May 2015

Full presentation here

Online ad spend grew to €27.3 billion in Europe in 2013

"At the 8th edition of its annual Interact conference IAB Europe today announced that online advertising grew 11.9% to a market value of €27.3bn in 2013.
The AdEx Benchmark research - the definitive guide to the state of the European online advertising market - revealed that online advertising enjoyed another year of sustained growth across Europe. Most markets have shown a significant and now more uniform level of growth than in previous years. Whilst developing markets continue to grow their share of total media spend, the more mature markets have benefited from innovation in online advertising technology and advances in monetizing mobile, enabling them to also further extend their growth curve. Changing consumer patterns have made mobile monetization more urgent and Western European markets in particular are responding to this challenge generating the majority of their growth from mobile. A robust macroeconomic framework has increased advertiser confidence and stimulated budget shifts to online.
Mobile has taken double-digit display market share for the first time, accounting for 11.5% with a growth rate of 128.5% compared with 2012.
Online video advertising also showed strong growth, increasing by 45.4% in 2013, to nearly €1.19bn. This is the first time in Europe that online video has crossed the €1billion mark.
Townsend Feehan, CEO of IAB Europe, noted the importance of the digital ecosystem to European growth. “These results confirm the increasing value contributed by digital advertising to Europe’s economy. Technology innovation is driving growth and it’s important that we continue to foster our European digital businesses to enable a strong European presence on the world stage.”
Mobile, video and big data continue to provide rich new ways to engage consumers and at Interact today we will explore the success stories and illustrate the power of digital services in enabling business growth.
The IAB Europe AdEx Benchmark study splits the online ad market into 3 broad segments: Display, Search and Classifieds and Directories. Growth in these online advertising formats has been underpinned by shifting uses in devices and changing consumption patterns.
In 2013, the Display Ad market experienced the highest growth across the categories at 14.9%, with a total value of €9.2bn.
Search showed growth of 13.0% - and a market value of €13.4 billion. Strong growth was recorded in many markets across Europe with Russia again being the out-perfomer at 34.4% search growth. Factors for growth included investment in search across different devices, boosting the mobile search figures, as consumers continue to increase their time spent online on the go and the continued investment from small to medium sized business in the medium.
The 2013 Classifieds and Directories market was relatively stable at €4.6bn showing growth of 3.6%. Central and Eastern European markets continued to benefit from the migration of spend from print classifieds to online and the switch to classifieds normally noted in more difficult economic circumstances. Scandinavian markets maintained their strong position in this category €256m in Sweden and €252m in Norway although with their level of maturity in the category comes a lesser level of growth. Market consolidation has brought scale and efficiency to this formerly fragmented sector.
Daniel Knapp, Director of Advertising Research at IHS Technology and author of the research, said, “The underlying dynamics of growth in online advertising have changed in 2013. Mobile, and cross-device consumption has so far been a challenge facing marketers, with underdeveloped ecosystems and fragmented measurement approaches hampering investment. Yet our study shows that mobile has now become a significant part of online ad spend. Advancements in advertising targeting technology, standardisation of formats and improvements in measurement have allowed important progress in bridging the consumption/ad spend divide in mobile. It is now imperative that market participants further evolve their data strategies and connect advertising experiences across different devices from mobile to desktop for sustainable market growth.”
The top 10 list of markets are as follows. Top Individual market growth was registered by Russia 26.8% and Turkey with 24.3%.
Top 10 Rankings
1. UK - €7.4bn
2. Germany – €4.7bn
3. France - €3.5bn
4. Russia – €1.8bn
5. Italy- €1.7bn
6. Netherlands - €1.3bn
7. Sweden - €0.9bn
8. Spain – €0.9bn
9. Norway - €0.7bn
10. Denmark - €0.6bn"
Source:  Press release from IAB Europe, 20th May 2014

European online retail spend by market in 2013

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Source:  RetailResearch.org, (Centre for Retail Research) retrieved 8th April 2014

European online retail as a percent of total retail by market

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Source:  RetailResearch.org, (Centre for Retail Research) retrieved 8th April 2014

Daily and Monthly active Facebook users in several European markets

"Germany – 19 million daily active users, 25 million monthly active users (43% of German Internet users are on Facebook, 76% of monthly users return daily), 13 million mobile DAU, 18 million mobile MAU (27% of German mobile phone users)
France – 18 million DAU, 26 million MAU (63% of French Internet users are on Facebook, 69% of monthly users return daily), 11 million mobile DAU, 17 million mobile MAU (33% of French mobile phone users)
Spain – 12 million DAU, 18 million MAU (58% of Spanish Internet users are on Facebook,  67% of monthly users return daily), 8.1 million mobile DAU, 13 million mobile MAU (32% of Spanish mobile phone users)
Italy – 17 million DAU, 23 million MAU (71% of Italian Internet users are on Facebook, 74% of monthly users return daily, ), 10 million mobile DAU, 16 million mobile MAU (32% of Italian mobile phone users)
Sweden – 3.8 million DAU, 4.9 million MAU (57% of Swedish Internet users are on Facebook, 78% of monthly users return daily) , 3 million mobile DAU, 4 million mobile MAU (53% of Swedish mobile phone users)
Turkey – 19 million DAU, 33 million MAU, 9.5 million mobile DAU, 20 million mobile MAU
Israel – 2.7 million DAU, 3.8 million MAU (71% of monthly users return daily), 2 million mobile DAU, 2.9 million mobile MAU"

Source:  Data from Facebook, compiled by TachCrunch, 29th December 2013

Windows Phones accounted for 10% of smartphones sold in EU5 in Q3 2013

"The latest smartphone sales data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, for the three months to September 2013, shows Windows Phone now makes up one in 10 smartphone sales across the five major European markets, has overtaken iOS in Italy, and is gaining momentum in emerging markets. Android remains the dominant operating system across Europe with 71.9%, an increase of 4.2 percentage points compared with the same period last year.

Windows Phone, driven almost entirely by Nokia sales, continues to make rapid progress in Europe and has also shown signs of growth in emerging markets such as Latin America.

[...]

In Britain, Windows accounts for 11.4% of the market. Android is still the number one operating system with 58.4% while BlackBerry now only has 3.1%. Apple’s iOS has dipped by 1.0 percentage point to 27.0%, although it is expected to strengthen at Christmas.

[...]

Compared with August Windows Phone made significant gains in Italy, where its once again above 10% market share, and in Spain, where it rose from 2.2 to 3.7% share. There was also strong progress in Australia, where it went from 6.5 to 9.3% of the market, while there was a slight rebound in USA from 3% to 4.6% market share. In other markets Windows Phone generally remained generally static, which is good news given the iPhone 5S and 5C launch. Overall it grew from 9.2 to 9.8% of the EU5 countries, less than 7% away from iOS market share in the region.

Source:  Data from Kantar, reported by WM Power User, 4th November 2013

Note - Full tables in the original article

Pre-Pay vs Pay-As-You-Go mobile contracts by market

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Source:  NielsenWire, 19th February 2013
Note - the UK figures seem wrong (only 17% of UK smartphone owners on pre-pay) - & the second chart seems to contradict it - "50% paid for data using a fixed monthly charge" - see below

Percent of internet users who access via mobile devices

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in September 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Note - This is based on 'generally' accessing the internet, so not 'ever' or 'in the last month' but 'regularly' 

Mobile & tablets as a percent of all internet access in 2012

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Source:  comScore data, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Take up of connected TVs and 3D TVs in 2012

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in October 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Take up of DVRs in 2012

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in October 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Take up of HDTV in 2012

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in October 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Media activities done regularly in 2012

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in September 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

Ownership & personal use of media devices in 2012

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Source:  Research by Ofcom, conducted in September 2012, reported in The Ofcom International Communications Report, December 2012

55% of mobile users in the big 5 markets in Europe have a smartphone

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Source:  3 month rolling data from comScore MobiLens for 3 months to October 2012, reported in a press release, 17th December 2012

62% of consumers across 12 markets use social media while watching TV

"The results of Ericsson ConsumerLab's annual study - presented in the TV & Video Consumer Trend Report 2012 - reveal that social TV is becoming a mass-market phenomenon.
Sixty-two percent of consumers use social media while watching TV on a weekly basis, an increase of 18 percentage points in one year. By gender, 66 percent of women engage in this behavior, compared to 58 percent of men. Twenty-five percent of consumers use social media to discuss what they are watching while they are watching it.
Niklas Rönnblom, Ericsson ConsumerLab Senior Advisor, says: "Mobile devices are an important part of the TV experience, as 67 percent of consumers use smartphones, tablets, or laptops for TV and video viewing. Furthermore, sixty percent of consumers say they use on-demand services on a weekly basis. Watching TV on the move is growing in popularity, and 50 percent of the time spent watching TV and video on the smartphone, is done outside the home, where mobile broadband connections are facilitating the increase."
Although viewing behaviors and demands are changing, only 7 percent of consumers say they will reduce their TV subscriptions in the future. In fact, instead of looking to cut costs, consumers are willing to pay more for an enhanced viewing experience: 41 percent of consumers say they are willing to pay for TV and video content in HD.
More than half of consumers want to be able to choose their own TV and video content. Rönnblom says: "As the number of screens and services increase, people are eagerly looking for an easy-to-use, aggregated service that can bring everything together. It should allow consumers to mix on-demand and linear TV including live content, facilitate content discovery, leverage the value of social TV and provide seamless access across devices.""
Source:  Press release from Ericsson, 28th August 2012
Methodology:  "Data was collected in Brazil, Chile, China, Germany, Italy, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, UK and the US. In all, 14 qualitative and 12,000 quantitative online interviews were conducted representing more than 460 million consumers."
Full presentation here

45% of smartphones sold in EU5 are made by Samsung

"The latest smartphone sales data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech shows that Samsung, buoyed by the release of the Samsung S3, is now the top selling brand across Europe with 45% share.
Samsung’s success has hugely benefited Android, with its share of the big five countries growing from 42.7% in July 2011 to 65.7% in July 2012. Android has also retained its number one position in Great Britain in the latest 12 weeks of sales (12 w/e 8th July 2012) with 59.5% share, up from 47% a year ago.
Dominic Sunnebo, global consumer insight director at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, comments: “While the majority of noise is focused on big-name products such as the S3 or S2, it’s easy to forget that Samsung is selling smartphones across all tiers. As a result it now makes up five out of the top ten best selling smartphones in Great Britain – with even the smartphone/tablet hybrid Samsung Galaxy Note making it into the top ten.”
Elsewhere, Apple continues its strong performance in the US with share up 9.5% over the past year to 38.2%. Dominic Sunnebo explains further: “As the iPhone 4S nears the end of its lifecycle, and rivals such as Samsung & HTC bring out new flagship products, we inevitably see big changes in share. However, Kantar Worldpanel ComTech data clearly shows that the proportion of Apple consumers who have owned their device for at least 18 months and not upgraded has increased markedly over the last quarter, indicating current owners are holding off upgrading until the release of the iPhone 5."

Source:  Press release from Kantar, 6th August 2012

European mobile benchmarks May 2012

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Source:  Data from comScore for the 3 months to May 2012, reported in a press release, 26th July 2012

Android accounts for over half of smartphone sales in EU5, US & Australia

"The latest data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech shows that for the first time Android has taken at least half of smartphone sales in Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, US and Australia.* Android's share now ranges from 49.6% in Italy to a massive 84.1% in Spain.
Dominic Sunnebo, consumer insight director, explains: “We are seeing much of the Android sales growth being driven by consumers trading up from feature phones to smartphones. Android handsets currently offer an easier platform to enable these consumers to upgrade, as many first time smartphone consumers state ‘price of handset’ and ‘multimedia capabilities’ as their main reason for choosing an Android device. Our data shows that Android has a higher share of those consumers spending under £50 on buying their handset across the vast majority of countries we cover.”
In markets like the UK, smartphone penetration in the prepay market is increasing, with Android handsets such as the Samsung Galaxy Ace and Y performing well. These models are attracting younger first time owners, a group who have traditionally been loyal to BlackBerry.
Dominic adds: “It’s important to understand the added value that these first time smartphone consumers bring to carriers and brands. When consumers trade-up from a feature phone, they spend significantly more on their bills and on buying their device. The increase in monthly bill becomes even more important to the carriers, when we consider that most mobile contracts have a 24 month minimum term.
“Smartphone consumers are much more loyal to their brand of handset and carrier than feature phone consumers, highlighting the importance of capturing feature phone owners when they are starting to look to change their handset.
“It’s also interesting to note that although Android’s share is high in the USA market, it has decreased by 6.8% points over the year. This trend contrasts Apple’s growth, which is a reflection of a successful iPhone 4S release and the first time availability of the iPhone 4 and 4S on Sprint.”"

Source:  Data from Kantar, reported in a press release, 11th July 2012
Full data tables here