UK adults bought 21m new connected devices during the lockdown

"One in five UK adults (21%) – the equivalent of 10.3 million consumers - purchased at least one new digital device as a result of spending more time at home because of the COVID-19 pandemic according to Deloitte’s Digital Consumer Trends 2020 report. In total, up to 21.2 million digital devices were purchased during the first two months of the lockdown period, including two million printers and monitors.

Deloitte’s research, carried out in May 2020 and surveying the digital habits of 4,150 respondents between the ages of 16 and 75, found that UK adults used 170.3 million devices* daily during the first two months of lockdown, equating to 3.5 devices on average per person.

Games consoles, laptops, smart speakers and eReaders saw the highest uptick in usage. Among those who own the devices, daily usage of games consoles rose by 10 percentage-points, with 44% of owners using their console daily, up from 34% in 2019. Meanwhile, daily smart speaker usage rose from 59% to 66%; laptop usage rose from 67% to 73%; and eReader usage rose from 30% to 34%.

Fitness bands and smart watches both experienced a decline in usage as consumers spent more time at home as a result of the pandemic. 60% of fitness band owners used their device daily during the lockdown period, down from 64% in 2019, while daily smart watch usage declined from 64% to 62%. This comes despite an overall increase in the adoption of wearables, from 27% to 31% in the last year."

Source:  Data from Deloitte, reported by Cambridge Wireless, 25th August 2020

More data here 

TikTok has over 50m daily active users in the US

 "TikTok, in its lawsuit challenging a ban by the President Donald Trump administration, revealed its monthly users have grown almost 800 percent since January 2018, CNBC reported.

Back then, the app was used by around 11 million Americans, according to CNBC. Then a year later, that number more than doubled as TikTok reported 27 million monthly users.

And finally, by this year, the app was averaging 91 million users per month, with over 100 million by the time the pandemic had set in and was keeping Americans at home, and over 50 million who use the app every day, according to CNBC.

Globally, the app has seen an equivalent spike, with 55 million in January 2018 increasing to 689 million by July 2020, CNBC reported."

Source:  PYMNTS, reporting data from CNBC, 24th August 2020

What households bought during the lockdown

 "In the 13 weeks ending June 27, 1 million more coffee and espresso makers sold and half a million more electric grills and griddles sold compared to the same period last year, according to NPD Group data. Additionally, single-serve blending and processing products saw a 41% increase in unit sales during the period. 

"We've seen it in other recessions, we also saw it after 9/11, that people kind of hunker down and leftovers become critical … making sure that I don't have any food waste," Derochowski said. "So when you think of leftover friendly dishes, there are a lot of your one-dish meals and things that can be made, whether it's [with] a multi cooker or slow cooker or casserole dish or something like this. Those have done well because people are making leftover-oriented foods.""

Source:  Data from NPD, reported by Retail Dive, 18th August 2020

More than 3bn people a month access Facebook's 'family' of services

Source:  Facebook's Q2 2020 earning slides, July 2020

Note - The 'family' of services is Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp

Adults in the UK watched more than 6 hours of video content a day during lockdown

Source:  Ofcom's Media Nations 2020 report, 5th August 2020

Full presentation here

Peacock has more than 10m subscribers

"Peacock, the latest major entrant to the streaming video universe, has added more than 10 million signups since its launch. Comcast, the owner of NBC News and Peacock's parent NBCUniversal, revealed Thursday as part of its second-quarter earnings.

“People are watching more frequently and for much longer than we projected,” NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell said on a call with analysts.

The news underscores the high interest in at-home entertainment at a time when consumers are staying home and movie theaters in most regions are closed."

Source:  NBC News, 30th July 2020

'Hamilton' attracted 750,000 new subscribers to Disney+

"A filmed version of the Hamilton Broadway theatre production premiered to much fanfare on the Disney+ streaming platform on July 3rd.

Consequently, the Disney+ app was downloaded 752,451 times globally between July 3rd and July 5th, including 458,796 times in the US alone, according to a report in Variety, citing analytics firm Apptopia.

It means US downloads were 74 per cent higher than the average of the four weekends in June 2020 over comparable time periods (Friday through Sunday)."

Source:  Advanced Television, 7th July 2020

Kids in the UK, US and Spain spend almost as much time with TikTok as YouTube

Source:  Data from Qustodio, reported by Techcrunch, 4th June 2020

Data provided by 60,000 families with kids aged 4-14 in UK, US and Spain

1/3 of Americans say they avoid restaurants with online ratings of less than 4 stars

"Online reviews are a key driver of restaurant revenue, with one-third of customers saying that they avoid eateries with ratings of less than four stars. Social media is just as vital to driving business, with 72 percent of customers reporting that they have used Facebook to decide where to eat. Both of these channels are plagued with fraud, however, including fake reviews and phishing scams on social media. This month’s Deep Dive explores how restaurants can identify fake reviews and have them removed, and how they can educate their customers to spot impostors on social media."

Source:  PYMNTS, 12th June 2020

25% of US households have a subscription to Disney+

Source:  Data from Parks Associates, reported 29th May 2020

The US was the top spending market for AVOD in 2019

Top five countries by AVoD expenditure ($ million)
Ranking Country 2019
1 USA 7,998
2 China 6,777
3 United Kingdom 1,620
4 Japan 1,611 4
5 India 632 5

Source:  Digital TV Research, quoted in Advanced Television, 1st June 2020

Digital ad expenditure in Europe reached €64,8bn in 2019

"IAB Europe, the leading European-level industry association for the digital advertising and marketing ecosystem, announced at its virtual Interact conference today that digital advertising grew 12.3 percent in 2019 to €64.8bn, driven by strong growth in out-stream video, mobile and social spend. On average €4bn has been added to the digital advertising market every year since 2006.
2020 Digital Advertising Forecast
Given the impact that COVID-19 that had on the industry’s operations and investments, the 2019 results were accompanied by a 2020 forecast for digital investment by IAB Europe’s Chief Economist Dr. Daniel Knapp. In its April 2020 forecast, the IMF predicted that Covid-19 and the global lockdown will spark the worst economic recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Knapp modelled his forecasts on macroeconomic indicators, paired with industry data to estimate a decline of 16.3% for Europe (including the UK). However, Knapp highlighted that digital is looking to be the least affected advertising media, predicting a decline by -5.5% in 2020 in Europe compared to a stronger contraction (-21.3%) for other media.
2019 Digital Advertising Investment
The AdEx Benchmark study is the definitive guide to advertising expenditure in Europe, covering 28 markets, and is now in its fourteenth year. In 2019, a total of twenty-one markets experienced double-digit year-on-year growth.
Video grew by nearly 30 percent to almost €10bn; out-stream was the driving force behind this growth with an increase of 36 percent. In some markets out-stream experienced growth of more than 40 percent, for example Finland, Greece and the UK.
Social is fueling display growth across Europe, up 25.6 percent year-on-year with double-digit growth in all twenty-eight markets. Search remains the largest online advertising category in terms of revenue with a growth of 11.8 percent and a market value of €28bn. Total mobile ad spend grew by 24.9 percent in 2019 to exceed €30bn to account for nearly half (47 percent) of all digital ad spend in Europe.
[...]
The IAB Europe AdEx Benchmark study divides the digital ad market into three categories: Display, Search and Classifieds and Directories. Growth in these advertising formats has been underpinned by shifting uses in devices and changing consumption patterns.
[...]
CEE continues to dominate the growth in Europe and in 2019, as in 2018. The top five largest growth markets all came from the CEE region:
Serbia – 28.4 percent
Ukraine – 28.0 percent
Belarus – 25.2 percent
Croatia – 22.3 percent
Turkey– 19.1 percent

Top 10 rankings (by market size) are:
UK – €21.4bn
Germany – €9.4bn
France – €6.1bn
Russia – €4.9bn
Italy – €3.2bn
Spain – €3.2bn
Sweden – €2.3bn
Netherlands – €2.3bn
Switzerland – €1.8bn
Norway – €1.3bn"
Source:  Press release from IAB Europe, 3rd June 2020
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