Laffitte Conseil

Broadband Conquers the World

When everyone has broadband, what does "broadband" mean?

The number of adult Internet users who connect via wired broadband may be peaking, according to Ipsos Insight's "The Face of the Web" study.

More than three-quarters of the online population in 12 major countries used broadband at the end of 2006, while just one-fifth used dial-up. In 2003, Ipsos Insight reported that 45% of adult Internet users were on dial-up connections while 56% used broadband.

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Social Networking for Jobs

Should Monster be scared?

Business-specific social networks have the attention of both employers and job seekers, and millions are using the sites.

LinkedIn, the best-known career social network, reported 89% growth in members from 2005-2006. The site has grown from 85,000 members in its first year to over eight million members.

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Digital TV Rises in India

Indian pay TV revenues will reach $10 billion by 2011, up from $4.2 billion in 2006, according to Media Partners Asia (MPA).

Pay TV penetration will reach 84% of all homes with TVs by 2011, up from 61% in 2006. There will be 107 million cable households by 2011, compared to 71 million in 2006.

Satellite subscriptions will increase as well. Direct-to-home (DTH) homes will reach 38 million by 2015, up from 1.9 million in 2006. Dish TV currently has 2.7 million DTH subscribers, while rival TataSky has nearly 0.8 million.

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User-Generated Content Hopes and Fears

More than half of media and entertainment executives surveyed in Accenture's "Global Content Survey 2007" cite user-generated content as a leading threat to their bottom line.

Two-thirds of respondents believe that within three years their businesses will be making money on user-generated content. A quarter does not yet know how that will happen.

So is the glass half-full?

Respondents agreed that short-form video offers the best growth potential over the next five years.

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Teens Bop to Digital Music

Teens are helping drive Apple's digital music market strength, according to Piper Jaffray's "Taking Stock with Teens" report. The study was conducted with the DECA association of marketing students, and it covered different types of student spending.

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Broadband Brings Broad Changes

Will zippier delivery speeds zap slower players?

As broadband connectivity spreads around the world, so do the value-added services of voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) and Internet protocol television (IPTV).

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Even Preteens Multitask

Is your toddler multitasking?

Multitasking begins as early as age 2, according to the NPD Group's "Kids' Leisure Time II" report.

Kids between the ages of 2 and 12 years old spend more than a quarter of their leisure time doing two or more activities at the same time. Favorite pastimes among the sample group included reading, using the computer, spending time with friends, listening to music and watching TV.

Kids today have plenty of leisure time, with 2-to-11-year-olds averaging roughly 68 hours a week, and 5-to-12-year-olds averaging 58 hours. Toddling 2-to-4-year-olds are true layabouts, averaging 94 hours of leisure time every week.

The NPD study concurs with a large-scale study of media behaviors among children and teens conducted in 2004 by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

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Google Website Optimizer, Part 1

Last week, Google announced the open beta for Google Website Optimizer, a free testing tool available to any AdWords marketer. Bryan Eisenberg had the opportunity to discuss it with Tom Leung, business product manager for Google.

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How to Win with Widget Marketing

Freewebs' president/CEO explains how to make widget marketing successful through a willful endorsement from site owners.

                   

To be added to the list of words that should be struck from the marketing vocabulary: "campaign." Campaign is a military term, and its use in marketing connotes the staging of repeated and/or sustained assault on targets, overpowering them with a resource inequity, flanking them to block a retreat, and ultimately compelling an unconditional surrender.

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TV Unplugged

"Every member of the mobile video value chain acknowledges that advertising will play a crucial role in developing the channel into a significant consumer service," says eMarketer Senior Analyst John du Pre Gauntt and the author of the new Mobile TV and Video: Big Dreams for the Smallest Screen report. "Unfortunately, nobody is quite sure exactly sure what that means."

Everyone agrees, however, that there is a demand for the service — and it's growing.

eMarketer forecasts that the total number of mobile TV and video subscribers globally will rise from 40 million in 2006 to over 750 million in 2011.

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