Questions raised over news sites’ local stats

This is getting ridiculous. Name one advertiser on the SMH.com.au website solely dependent on a market defined as metro Sydney?

“Are the networks pushing people from site to site to try and build topline unique browser numbers?”

I believe so. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve clicked a story on SMH and found myself reading it on WA Today or Brisbane Times, even when it’s not a WA or Qld-based story. The only reason I can see for that would be to use the SMH’s brand muscle to bolster the numbers for its smaller siblings.

Sorry Tim, are we talking degrees here or the principal of not reporting interstate traffic? Given that the SMH is listed here as part of this ‘analysis’, my question stands.

I’m pretty sure all RSS feeds for Fairfax websites now direct you to the WA Today version of a story when you click through to read it online. No matter which site you subscribed to the feed on. Definitely the case across most of the blog feeds.

It’s coded very specifically, too. A link that appears to deliver a blog feed from blogs.smh.com.au is hard coded as blogs.watoday.com.au. I can only imagine ‘tweaks’ like that help prop up less populated sections of the Fairfax Network.

I understand the issue of audiences arriving from ‘out of town’ but this information has always been available from the publishers themselves, all you had to do was ask. Often enough their figures would be very close to what Nielsen is now reporting.

That said, I completely agree with Ben when he asks if they are tunneling traffic to help build overall audience figures.

It shouldn’t be new, but if you’re buying a state targeted campaign, use IP targeting and if you’re buying Australia only, ask for it.

Umm, do you realise that the IP ranges on which the geo-location data depends changes on a regular basis? There is no consistent list of IP ranges. Over time IPs drift, causing fundamental issues for services like Nielsen’s and any IP targeting systems.

Was Google perhaps punishing duplicated content in search results, leaving the sites to link to the original article rather than reposting it under localised sections? Or perhaps we’re not as tribal as we used to be and we’re sharing/clicking links outside of our territories?

I’d be interested to know what the entry pages for traffic on these sites are now, are readers still heading to their bookmarked front page and browsing or are we more likely to be clicking on links forwarded by others or coming up in news/keyword searches?

Ben, you’re using Nielsen data which itself is reliant on out-of-date IP ranges. ISPs change IP ranges all the time and can change IP ranges from one state to the next. Get it? Your analysis is using inaccurate data. The % figures indicating local versus interstate traffic is wrong.

You’re presuming that the ads on each site are blanket and not targeted to begin with. I know with the likes of The West they’re not targeted, but the Fairfax and News site mostly are. Example: if I’m in the United States, I’ll get primarily US ads based on the IP address when visiting local newspaper sites. I’ll usually get Melbourne ads on the Sydney Morning Herald, least on the display ads (and where there’s local ads in their system.)

To answer Ben and the overall point about non-state based visitors: you need to consider that content is universal and a good story on The West or Courier Mail could be linked to from across the world. Every now and then I see a link to The Advertiser on Fark or Reddit for example.

If the papers are doing very basic IP targeting of ads (and I’d argue most do) the statement “This is an issue because advertisers who choose to go with local mastheads are often paying to target a local audience” isn’t really an issue because the company will be offering a local audience for those ads. IP targeting isn’t hard, in fact it’s a basic feature on all ad platforms.

Of course sites receive traffic from other states – and countries too. You cant lock out people just because they are in another state…

I frequent the BBC and Guardian websites daily from Australia but see Aussie adverts. I was thinking about this the other day. I am planning a trip to Europe mid year and when I look at UK sites I get Aussie ad’s served up. (I have the strong Aussie dollar and it would be beneficial for UK companies to be advvertising to me, because i am heading over there…)

Geo targeting can narrow ad’s down to very localised area’s – I suppose it can be one or the other:

You get ad’s served up based on where you are or ad’s served up based on where the product is. perhaps the user could choose what ad’s they wish to see…?

“View ad’s where you are” “View ad’s where we are”…

It will only get better and better for the user and the advertiser.

I understand that advertisers would want to focus on their local niche market – but in the case of theage.com.au for example, a luxury car manufacturer would not mind cashed up Sydney-siders viewing the advertisement as well.

Where is the suprise? ANy media planner with a calulator should have known this. The dynamics a pretty simlple and hardly new.

If specific local market coverage is an objective then try using geo-targeted adserving.

A more interesting issue would have been publishers farming impressions to affiliate mastheads to bolster site numbers.