| KickApps Unveils User-Generated Video Tool |
| Friday, Jul 14, 2006 10:52 AM ET |
| IN HOPES OF CAPITALIZING ON the buzz surrounding social networking as a tool for marketing and customer loyalty, the company KickApps has unveiled a product that allows Web publishers to deploy user-generated video and social networking functionality directly on their sites. |
| HP Breaks Video Ads Online |
| by Wendy Davis, Thursday, Jul 13, 2006 6:00 AM ET |
| COMPUTER GIANT HEWLETT-PACKARD WEDNESDAY LAUNCHED new video ads online as part of the company's continuing branding campaign for its personal computers. The 30- and 60-second ads, featuring reality TV producer Mark Burnett and Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, are available on a variety of video sites, including YouTube, iFilm, and Google, as well as HP's own microsite for the campaign. A third clip starring producer and singer Pharrell Williams will debut online shortly. All three ads will break later this year on national and cable TV, with the Mark Burnett spot slated to appear on his new show "Gold Rush." The video clips represent the latest phase of the online portion of HP's current branding initiative, which carries the slogan "The Computer Is Personal Again," and aims to promote computers as expressions of users' individuality. Other components of the online campaign include a Facebook "profile" for the HP notebook and an online personal ad on MySpace, among other initiatives, said Tracey Trachta, director worldwide consumer advertising at HP. The Web ads reflect HP's attempt to experiment with unusual online ad units, Trachta said. "We could put out 200 banner ads or five things that are cool and make a difference," she said, adding that the Web campaign is designed to build buzz about the ads before they appear on TV. "Online is incredibly powerful in terms of word-of-mouth and is a really effective engine for distributing and engaging with our target audience." In the spots, the stars' images are truncated at the neck so that their faces aren't on screen. Users who click through are taken to a microsite which has more in-depth information (an image of one of the star's desktops, for instance) as well as outtakes and other extras. The new clips mark an extension of a campaign that launched on TV this May. The ads that broke this spring starred snowboarder Sean White and hip-hop artist Jay-Z. Those clips also are available online on YouTube and other sites. Goodby, Silverstein & Partners created the units and designed the microsite, which was built by Agency.com. ZenithOptimedia handled media buying duties. |
| Atlas Creates VOD Ad Network |
| by Erik Sass, Thursday, Jul 13, 2006 6:00 AM ET |
| DIGITAL MARKETING TECHNOLOGY COMPANY ATLAS has forged a deal with Concurrent Technology, a digital video tech firm, and Everstream, a digital ratings data service owned by Concurrent, to create a network for buying, executing, and tracking the results of digital video ads. By coordinating the efforts of the three companies, Atlas hopes to gain a competitive edge by achieving economies of scale and greater efficiency for customers. The alliance will allow advertisers to deliver addressable TV ads via both broadband and cable connections for insertion in video-on-demand programming. Atlas' portion of the alliance will provide automated campaign management, Concurrent will supply the VOD itself, and Everstream will track the results. Gary Trimm, CEO of Concurrent, pointed to precise targeting and increased accountability as the big payoff for advertisers and media execs: "Targeted ad insertion and quantitative reporting of this data are critical to ensuring the prolonged success of VOD's evolving advertising revenue model." But many advertisers have indicated they think VOD services are a lackluster ad platform, for a variety of reasons. In part, VOD itself doesn't seem to have generated as much consumer demand as some expected, because audiences think much of the programming isn't of interest. According to the E-Poll study "Video on Demand: Attitudes and Opportunities," many viewers feel it's a "last resort for television." Another consumer complaint was the cost of VOD programming, often charged on a per-item basis. What's more, 83 percent of E-Poll respondents said they would accept a 60-second commercial "for a product they are interested in" in return for free VOD. Scott Ferris, senior vice president and general manager for Atlas, acknowledged that the industry was "still in the early stages of establishing the infrastructure for the next-generation VOD advertising model." |
| Podcast Users Outnumber Bloggers |
| by Wendy Davis, Thursday, Jul 13, 2006 6:00 AM ET |
| U.S. ADULTS WHO DOWNLOAD PODCASTS now outnumber those who publish blogs, according to new data by Nielsen//NetRatings. More than 9.2 million Web users, or 6.6 percent of U.S. adult Web users, have downloaded an audio podcast in the last 30 days, compared to 6.7 million users (4.8 percent) who published blogs in that time, according to the research company. Nielsen//NetRatings also reported that around 5.6 million online adults (4 percent) have downloaded a video podcast in the last 30 days. Podcast downloaders tend to be younger than the online population at large. Web users between the ages 18 and 24 are 72 percent more likely than the average Web user to listen to audio podcasts and 47 percent more likely to view video podcasts. Users older than 45 were less likely than average to listen or view podcasts. Web users who use podcasts are far more likely to visit certain content sites than the average Web user, according to Nielsen//NetRatings. Those who use audio podcasts are 506 percent more likely than average to visit Macworld, 453 percent more likely to visit Lycos Wired News, and 444 percent more likely to visit Slashdot. Video podcast users were 764 percent more likely than the average user to visit StarTrek.com, a CBS Paramount site based on the 40-year-old "Star Trek" TV franchise. Video podcast users were also 630 percent more likely than average to visit Live365.com, and 624 percent more likely than average to visit Fark.com. |
| Survey: Even when patients fill their Rx, most are noncompliant |
| Despite pharma efforts to improve patient medication compliance, 35% of patients did not fill all of the prescriptions they received, a number that has changed little in the past three years, according to a 2006 survey of 32,000 patients. The survey from Wilson Health Information also showed that even when patients filled their prescriptions, 65% of them were not compliant with their medications, either because they didn't take all of their medicine or didn't take it as directed. The top reasons that patients didn't fill their prescriptions were that they didn't think they were needed (42%), they were too expensive (27%), and they changed doctors (20%). Forgetfulness (79%) was the most frequently cited reason for not taking their medicine as directed, followed by running out of medicine (19%), and cost (9%). Only 7% of respondents cited side effects as a reason for noncompliance. |
ZenithOptimedia Ups Online Advertising Outlook
Internet ad spending will account for 7.0 percent of global ad spend in 2008, according to a forecast update from ZenithOptimedia, which increased its outlook from April, when it had projected a 6.5 percent share (and 6.0 percent in December) for internet ad spend, reports ClickZ. The "pace of development in Internet advertising" was the factor cited for the most recent upgrade.
Online advertising spend is expected to reach $23.9 billion this year, $28.6 billion in 2007 and $32.5 billion in 2008 - or an increase of 75 percent from the $18.5 billion in 2005, according to ZenithOptimedia.
ZenithOptimedia estimates that financial services advertisers were the biggest online spenders in 2005, accounting for $1.6 billion in online ad spend, writes MediaPost; telecommunications companies were second with $1.5 billion, followed by retailers ($1.3 billion) and car companies ($700 million).
| Web is the prime venue for reaching health mega-influencers |
| According to Manhattan Research, there are 142.4 million consumers who have an extended impact on the healthcare decisions of their loved ones. Targeting these mega-influencers can help pharmas get their message to hard-to-reach populations. The Internet is an optimal venue for targeting them, says Erika S. Fishman, Manhattan Research senior analyst. "Compared to the general population, the mega-influencers are considerably more likely to go online in any capacity: go online for health, and go online for pharmaceutical information," she tells ePharm5. According to the study, the mega-influencers can impact another 152.9 million people, especially those with diabetes, hypertension, arthritis, heart disease, asthma, high cholesterol, chronic pain, and depression. |
2 hours, 51 minutes ago
MONDAY, July 10 (HealthDay News) -- A new survey finds that American women are greatly uninformed about the threats posed by lung cancer and how it can affect them.
Published by the U.S. National Lung Cancer Partnership, the 2006 survey of more than 500 women not only lists the statistical realities of lung cancer in this country -- it also reveals a widespread lack of awareness by millions.
"This survey is a current snapshot of women's attitudes and beliefs about lung cancer, and it's frightening -- especially considering the extensive media coverage on the topic after Peter Jennings' and Dana Reeve's deaths. Women need to know the truth about lung cancer," Regina Vidaver, executive director of the National Lung Cancer Partnership (NLCP), said in a prepared statement.
According to the NLCP, lung cancer affects more than 80,000 American women annually, with over 70,000 cases proving to be fatal. Thirty thousand more women die annually from lung cancer than from breast cancer, they noted. In fact, lung cancer claims the lives of more women than breast, uterine, and ovarian cancers combined.
Other vital findings include:
Only 41 percent of women know that lung cancer is the leading cancer killer in the United States. Only 8 percent of women understand that exposure to radon gas is the second leading cause of lung cancer. Instead, 60 percent of women share the mistaken belief that exposure to secondhand smoke is the number two cause. Only 36 percent of women are aware that lung cancer kills more women than breast cancer. Only 29 percent know that lung cancer kills more women than breast, ovarian and uterine cancers combined. Only 41 percent of women know that one in every 17 women will develop a lung malignancy in her lifetime. Only 18 percent of women know that women make up the majority of young (under age 40) lung cancer patients. Only 4 percent of women know that women typically do better than men following lung cancer treatment.Another crucial subject addressed was that a quarter of all women "mistakenly believe there is a standard screening test to detect lung cancer in its early stages. Although such tests are in development, there is no clinically-approved screening test for this nation's top cancer killer", the NLCP said in a statement.
"Lung cancer is often perceived as a man's disease, yet it affects tens of thousands of women, and we're very concerned that women seem to be in the dark when it comes to the facts about lung cancer and the significant impact lung cancer can have on their lives," said Dr. Joan Schiller, president of the NLCP.
More information
For more information on lung cancer and treatment, please visit Women and Lung Cancer.
| Health Web sites should use few graphics for low-literacy users |
| Web users with low literacy skills face significant barriers when trying to use the Internet for health information, health literacy expert Christina Zarcadoolas, PhD writes in Hospitals and Health Networks. However, there are ways to modify Web sites to make them more accessible, and doing so can open the Internet to millions of additional health information seekers. Rather than filling sites with a lot of text and graphics, sites should use more basic navigation tools. Links embedded in highlighted text are easier to use than graphic links, such as logos or photos, and sites should use fewer pop-up windows. Language can also present a barrier. Although roughly 90 million adults in the United States have a reading level at or below fifth grade, most Web information is written at a 10th-grade level. |
