Audiweb has made the new Audiweb Week report available on the website with the summary of the online audience data for the week between 1 and 7 June 2020 of the publishers participating in the Audiweb Daily / Weekly survey and who have instrumented the TAG / SDK for the activation of the census component.
At the same time, an analysis of the trend of the most relevant site categories was developed – News & Information (with the main sub-category Current Events & Global News driving the entire category), Home & Fashion, Entertainment, Family Lifestyle – and registered in the Audiwed Weekly survey, in order to represent in a complete and detailed way how much and how the audiences were influenced by the main events of the Covid-19 emergency period, from Phase 1 which marked the beginning of the lockdown for all of Italy, at the beginning of Phase 3 of “new normal”. The trend analysis was developed starting from the average changes of the sites in all the weeks from February 17 to June 7 compared to the pre-emergency period (average week 20 / 1-16 / 2). The trends of the individual categories are observed using the value of the previous weeks as an index (index 100: average of the 4 weeks 20 / 01-16 / 02).
The overall curve – relating to the sites of the categories analyzed – summarizes the general trend of audiences in the various phases of the Covid-19 emergency: the initial momentum, at the start of the first Emergency Phase, with very high variations (index = 170) they are gradually reduced but with evident peaks in correspondence with decisive events, to the point of tending towards the “new normal”, characterized by more contained data than the initial surge, but still slightly higher than the average of the pre-emergency weeks.
Entering into the heart of the different phases of the analyzed period and the trends of the most relevant individual categories in Audiweb Weekly, the initial acceleration of the News & Information category sites immediately emerges in correspondence with the news on the first infections, followed by the Broadcasters that affect the Entertainment category . The sustained increase in sites in the Home & Fashion category dedicated to cooking and recipes is followed by waning phases alternating with resumptions that also maintain higher audience levels in Phase 2 than in the pre-virus period.
In the same period, the data for the Home & Fashion category, and in particular the Food & Cooking sites, are influenced by the anniversary of the carnival. The growth of the Family & Lifestyle sites is less evident, which contains the main contents dedicated to women, whose slight increase in this period is not attributable to the Covid theme.
Starting from the weeks immediately following the peak of 11 March and up to 26 April, therefore in full emergency phase 1, values well above the average are observed for all the categories observed whose contents, for different reasons, have played a role relevant in the daily life of Italians. The News & Information sites, thanks to the news in real time, have been crucial in responding to the almost compulsive need to be updated on the pandemic and on the measures of the institutions. The role of the sites of the Home & Fashion category was also important which, also due to the impossibility of going out and the approaching Easter holidays, were for Italians a source of inspiration for new recipes and in general for the themes of food & cooking, thanks to the rediscovery of domestic preparations.
Even the Entertainment category, driven by Broadcasters and sites dedicated to the world of books and reading, attracted the attention of Italians in search of alternative forms of entertainment, marking an average growth despite the suffering of Sport and Radio sites for which we observe the negative effect of stopping sports activities and mobility. Finally, the sites of the Family & Lifestyle category also saw their audience increase, albeit to a lesser extent than the other categories. This phase proceeds by fluctuations over the various weeks and seems to end concurrently with the announcement, on April 26, of the so-called “Phase 2” which, starting from May 4, would gradually reopen many activities.
Precisely during “Phase 2”, between May 4 and June 3, we are moving towards normalization of the audience and we observe a downward trend in all categories, with data in any case higher than in the pre-emergency period. If on the one hand the attention for the economic repercussions rises, on the other the increasingly less critical news from the health front, the resumption of various work activities, the possibility of being able to carry out some sporting activities far from home and the rediscovered mobility in the regional context temper the explosive effect of the health emergency on the audience of the sites. This phase is not without exceptions such as the Home & Fashion categories in the week 11-17 May and Family & Lifestyle in the week 25-31 May whose peaks are attributable to the positive performance of individual sites.
Finally, from 3 June, with the total reopening of interregional mobility, the new normality is in effect. A different context than that of the beginning of the emergency in which the categories show values that are close to those of the beginning of February. In fact, by analyzing the trend of Audiweb Week data for the week from 1 to 7 June just published compared to the previous one, overall drops are noted on most brands. These changes must be read in the light of the exit from the phase of full emergency and the start of the reopening phase of interregional movements, therefore as a natural consequence with respect to the emergency context. With regard to the categories made up of more than 10 brands, there are decreasing data for all of them except for Family & Lifestyle which is stable with a + 1%. The News & Information category recorded -2% while the Current Events & Global News sub-category fell by -6%.
Compared to the pre-Covid period, the data for the week between 1 and 7 June shows a still sustained value for News & Information (+ 24%) driven by Current Events & Global News (+ 28%) category for which the first The week of June, also thanks to the news of the reopening and the news of politics, represented a period of strong growth. Data still high also for Home & Fashion (+ 23%) mainly driven by the sites of the Food & Cooking sub-category and a slight growth for Family & Lifestyle. The Entertainment category remains unchanged compared to the pre-Covid period; this trend is mainly determined by the Broadcast Media sub-category which, concurrently with the end of the television season, begins to record the first data in decline.
Also with regard to the ‘Video’ data of the publishers enrolled in this survey in the week 1-7 June, the same trend is recorded for the “Text” data, with declining data for almost all the brands that tend to return towards levels pre-emergency.
The latest Audiweb Week report of the week 1-7 June is available on the website www.audiweb.it in the “Services>Audiweb Week data” section and on the “Archive” page for previous publications, which can be downloaded after free registration. In the Audiweb Week report, the week’s data are organized by Brand and Sub-brand of publishers participating in the survey service and represented according to the categories and sub-categories to which they belong, so as to offer a complete view of the different contents and services available online. There are also two sections: one relating to “Text” data (use of static content) and one to “Video” data (use of video content).
– The table with the Audiweb Week data, from the week 1-7 June (.xls)
