SCHAUMBURG, Ill. (March 14, 2006) – The board of the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) approved the launch of a new service, ABC Rapid Report, which gives consumer magazines the option to report circulation by issue, within weeks of its “on sale” date. The new online reporting tool will detail issue-by-issue top-line circulation figures, including subscriptions, single-copy sales, and total paid, verified, and analyzed non-paid circulation. Several publishers, representing more than 35 individual magazine titles, are currently beta-testing Rapid Report, which will launch to ABC members for July-dated issues. Publisher participation in the service is optional, at no additional cost. ABC Rapid Report data will be available free to all ABC members with online access.
“This is a monumental leap forward for ABC and the print media industry,” said Donald J. Miceli, vice president of global media services, Kraft Foods. “With online access to timely, per-issue circulation data, media planners and buyers will be better informed and able to gauge traditional print media against other competitive media.”
“Magazine publishers enthusiastically support this new ABC initiative,” said David W. Leckey, executive vice president of consumer marketing at American Media Inc. “While print remains the most engaging of media, we recognize that advertisers have other choices. ABC’s Rapid Report service will allow us to be more responsive to market demands, provide greater accountability to our advertisers, and demonstrate the superb value of print media.”
The ABC board also approved the launch of a new audit service, Agent Compliance Evaluation (ACE), for magazine subscription sales agents. With this new optional program, ABC will evaluate an agent’s ability to support the audit process, providing magazine publishers with added assurance that an ABC-member subscription agent has the potential to execute ABC-compliant programs. The service will assess and test such areas as record-keeping systems, transaction processing, sub-agent orders, and internal controls, measured against ABC rules, policies, and practices. This optional annual service will be available to all ABC-member subscription agents this summer.
“Verified” Circulation Criteria
The ABC board finalized the language and qualifying criteria for its newly created “verified” magazine circulation category (Rule F 15.1). The board agreed to incorporate analyzed non-paid direct request and list/directory sources that offer an opt-out option into the new category. The board also gave final approval to verified circulation reporting categories, which are mapped to Standard Industrial Codes. “Verified public place” categories include automotive outlets, health-care providers, hotels, and personal-care salons. “Individually addressed” categories include club members, event participants, organization members, show attendees, and survey respondents.
Consumer magazines may begin reporting verified subscription circulation in the June 2006 six-month reporting period. Prototypes of ABC Publisher’s Statements reflecting final qualification criteria are posted on the ABC Web site.
“The development of ABC’s Rapid Report and ACE programs and the finalization of the new verified circulation category demonstrate the ABC collaborative process at its finest,” said ABC Chairman of the Board Robert Troutbeck, president of Troutbeck-Chernoff advertising agency. “In our unique tripartite forum, industry issues are addressed and solutions developed that serve all ABC members. We’ve made wonderful progress in vital areas over the past 18 months, and we will continue to move the organization forward, building on our foundation of accountability, credibility, and trust—all essential in today’s media environment.”
Key Newspaper Actions
The ABC board modified and approved the final format of the Insert Verification Service (IVS) audit report. The board agreed that the report will carry a two-year shelf life, show average paid circulation from the most recent Audit Report or two Publisher’s Statements, and feature net and gross error rates on the front page. ABC will also explore building a cumulative database for advertiser members to analyze their preprint advertising investments across all participating newspapers.
With the addition this month of the Richmond Times Dispatch (Richmond, VA) and Post and Courier (Charleston, SC), 25 newspapers have now enrolled in ABC’s Insert Verification Service.
The ABC board also voted to enhance third-party barter sales standards with several stipulations, including two-week advance notice to ABC of program details, a $25,000 limit on the value of a barter item, the availability of items within the newspaper’s market without any additional purchase requirements, and the exclusion of items generally available for free in the public domain.
The ABC board agreed to enhance its Reader Profile service for newspapers by expanding information across multiple demographic categories, extending participation to additional ABC-member newspapers, improving the timeliness of the data in the reports, standardizing research-study geographies, and simplifying the report format.
ABC announced that it would release a Reader Profile FAS-FAX report in tandem with the traditional March 2006 newspaper FAS-FAX. The new Reader Profile FAS-FAX report will list top-line information taken from ABC reports, including readers by gender and age segments, household income, reach percentages, readers per copy, and readers by acquisition source. The release of both reports is scheduled for May 8.
“For the first time, our newspaper members’ readership data will be organized in a single on-line file, as a complement to the release of our traditional FAS-FAX circ data,” noted Michael J. Lavery, ABC president and managing director. “This means ABC advertiser members will have, in a single place, verified, credible, and comparable readership data coupled with its related circulation data.”
Key Business Publication Actions
The ABC board agreed that a business publication distributed entirely in digital format could qualify for ABC membership, provided all other qualification criteria are met.
Effective immediately, the ABC board also voted to modify the qualification guidelines for digital editions, allowing links to a business publication’s Web site to substitute for editorial content that normally appears in print editions, provided the Web site contains updated or expanded content.
The ABC board also endorsed the concept of creating an optional enhanced Publisher’s Statement that will integrate various audience channels, such as Web site activity and pass-along numbers, to report a “total reach” figure for business publications. The board is also developing partnership rules for these publications. Further review and discussion of these items will take place at the July 2006 board meeting.
Other Key Board Actions
The ABC board modified its bylaws to expand the circumstances under which the board may impose individual sanctions (other than censure) on its members. These sanctions may include exclusion from FAS-FAX, undergoing four semi-annual audits, submitting a plan of corrective action, notification to members, and/or a cash fine.
ABC elected to the board Charlie Rutman, CEO of MPG North America, as an advertising agency director. ABC also announced that it has formed a new magazine agent/fulfillment subcommittee that will review and discuss issues relevant to subscription sales agents and subscription fulfillment.
The ABC board of directors meeting was held March 8-10 in Sarasota, Fla. A broader summary of the board’s actions is posted online at ABC’s Virtual Pressroom. The organization is hosting regional briefing sessions for its newspaper members March 22 in Newark and Las Vegas and, for magazine members, March 23 in New York. Interested attendees can register on the ABC Web site.
With more than 4,000 members in North America, ABC is a forum of the world’s leading magazine and newspaper publishers, advertisers and ad agencies. The organization provides credible, verified information essential to the media buying and selling process. ABC maintains the world’s foremost electronic database of audited-circulation information and an array of verified readership, subscriber demographics and online activity data. To learn more, visit http://www.accessabc.com.
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