GenDigital

Top Celebrities & Athletes - Q4 2011

Here's a look at the most popular celebrities and professional athletes from the Q4 wave of the Top Ten List report. On a sequential basis, Daniel Tosh experienced the largest increase in popularity among teen and college guys. Among female respondents, Ryan Gosling shot up the ranks of the list to secure top billing for the first time. Taylor Lautner had been number one for the past five quarters. The big story on the female celebrity side of things is Mila Kunis. She number one among the guys and number two among the young ladies. It's rare (especially in the female celeb category) to see both teen/college males and females rank the the same celebrity as high as they did, but the occasional exception pops up and this is one of those cases.

The most popular pro athletes category saw quite a bit of change compared to the prior quarter. Tim Tebow replaced LeBron James the top athlete among teen and college guys, while the Denver QB was also number one among teen and college females for the first time. Tiger Woods was the last pro athlete to be number one in a wave of Top Ten among both teen/college males and females and you have to go back almost five years for that, so that's quite a statement being made by the audience for Tebow.

Top Male Celebrities (By Gender)

Among Males

1. Will Ferrell

2. Matt Damon

3. Brad Pitt

4. Daniel Tosh

5. Bradley Cooper

Among Females

1. Ryan Gosling

2. Taylor Lautner

3. Ryan Reynolds

4. Johnny Depp

5. Bradley Cooper

Top Female Celebrities (By Gender)

Among Males

1. Mila Kunis

2. Jessica Alba

3. Megan Fox

4. Zooey Deschanel

5. Scarlett Johansson

Among Females:

1. Rachel McAdams

2. Mila Kunis

3. Jennifer Aniston

4. Reese Witherspoon

5. Emma Stone

 

World Cup 2010

Ok, let's be honest here, up until a few weeks ago, how many of you were familiar with a vuvuzela? Undoubtedly, even we were surprised to see how World Cup fever has gripped this country's youth audience especially in between proms, graduation parties and the start of summer break. The bulk of the audience's TV sports consumption is dominated by football, basketball and baseball, so to see an event like the World Cup rate so highly in this month's Insights Immersion is significant. At least part of the excitement can be linked directly to two factors: coverage and technology and clearly there are synergies between the two factors.

June is kind of a funny month for sports coverage as the NBA wraps up its season, while baseball approaches the mid-season mark. That said, it's fair to say there is a bit of a void so the timing of this year's World Cup is super strategic. The coverage on-air, online and even via mobile devices is reminiscent of an Olympic Games: thoroughly comprehensive and seemingly never ending. If you're a sports fan, it's almost as if you have to tune-in at some point. And that's exactly what the audience has been doing as noted by this month's findings.

World Cup Viewer and Fan Statistics:

- watched at least one game: 27% (37% of males/16% of females)

- watched more than one game: 20% (28% of males/12% of females)

- watched the U.S. team play: 26% (35% of males/16% of females)

- streamed a game online: 16% (24% of males/8% of females)

- streamed game highlights or interviews online: 23% (34% of males/11% of females)

- watched a game on a mobile device: 3% (6% of males/1% of females)

- watched game highlights or interviews on a mobile device: 5% (10% of males/1% of females)

- visited websites like ESPN Soccernet or Yahoo! Sports for World Cup info: 29% (41% of males/17% of females)

- Used Facebook or Twitter to follow World Cup-related activities: 16% (22% of males/10% of females)

Q1 2010 College Top Ten List Report Highlights

Another quarter is almost complete and that brings us a new wave of Top Ten. College is the first to come out this week followed by Kids and Teens next Monday. For some reason, may be it's just the simplicity of the report, Top Ten garners more press mentions than any other YT report, go figure, but I think the concept of ranking against a particular topic is something that most everyone can relate to pretty easily.

Moving onward here, the Q1 wave of College Top Ten was tweaked a bit as the celeb category was broken out by more general Hollywood celeb personalities and sports-specific personalities. We'll also continue to rotate between most socially responsible companies/brands and favorite sports-related activities. When all is said, we covered a total of 12 individual categories including favorite TV shows, magazine titles, musical artists, movie & DVD titles, male Hollywood celebs, female Hollywood celebs, sports celebs, video game titles, web destinations, clothing retailers/brands, footwear brands and sports-related activities. To read the full background and view the table of contents, click here. For non Youth Trends subscribers, Top Ten can be downloaded/purchased for $399.

Some topline highlights:

- TV: relatively unchanged at the top compared to Q4 '09, White Collar debuts among males and American Idol makes a surprise appearance among females

- Mag titles: six of the top ten titles among females are trending downwards on a sequential basis, sorta sums of the category's picture fairly well

- Musical artists: goo goo for Gaga and welcome to the list NeedToBreathe

- Movies & DVDs: V-Day performs as expected, no let up for The Hangover

- Hollywood/sports celebs: Jessica's back at the top, LeBron is still king and Elisha debuts for the first time

- Video game titles: COD Modern Warfare 2, 'nuff said

- Web sites: check out Sporcle, it's legit...

Sports Media Consumption Trends: It's All About College Football

The results of the latest Insights Immersion leads us to believe that between emerging digital and mobile consumption channels coupled with good ole fashioned school spirit, college football seems to be more popular than ever. 

On a year over year basis, all major activity measurements experienced an increase including live attendance, on-air viewing, online streaming, mobile updates and alerts and mobile app downloads. What's more, we're seeing a sizable increase in interest for consumption via online and mobile. Here's a look at the latest findings based on activity since the start of the new school year:

- Attended a college football game: 37%, up from 32%

- Watched a college football game on TV: 41%, up from 38%

- Streamed a college game online: 17%, up from 11%

- Read a college football-related blog or microblog: 18%, up from 8%

- Received a score update/alert via mobile: 19%, up from 7%

- Downloaded a sports-related mobile app: 14%, up from 3%

- At least somewhat interested in accessing mobile updates and video: 27%, up from 19%

 

- At least somewhat interested in streaming a game online: 35%, up from 22%

March Madness Is A True Multimedia Experience

We're just a few short days away from the start of the NCAA men's basketball national tournament more commonly referred to as March Madness. From a social television viewing perspective, the men's basketball tournament is unique in its ability to draw in groups of friends multiple times over the course of a two and half week time period. Next to the Super Bowl, the men's bball tournament has consistently ranked as the top social TV viewing sporting event of the year among teens and college students. The tournament has also become somewhat of a pioneer when it comes to multimedia offerings and integration. The games can be streamed online, interested fans can get video highlights and score alerts on their mobile phones and certainly let us not forget about the millions of bracket sheets downloaded from sites like ESPN.com and CBS Sports.com. For college basketball fans, March Madness represents the ultimate multimedia experience. Here's a quick look at expected March Madness-related activities:

- plan to watch some of most of the games on TV: 38%, up from 35% last year (51% of men and 26% of women)

- plan to watch as many games as possible on TV: 32%, up from 28% last year (47% of men and 17% of women)

- plan to watch some of the games with two or more friends: 28%, up from 25% last year (34% of men and 22% of women)

- plan to stream at least one game online: 23%, up from 21% last year (34% of men and 12% of women)

- plan to fill out a bracket sheet at an online sports destination: 34%, up from 32% last year (47% of men and 21% of women)

- plan to use a mobile device to receive a score alert or watch a video highlight: 19% (33% of men and 5% of women)

ESPN Formally Enters High School Sports Space

It was only a matter of time...right? Going back to last fall, it seemed like we received an email or press package on a weekly basis from either a start up organization or major media company that decided to enter to the online arena to cover high school sports. While many of these upstart properties received favorable media attention and lots and lots of venture dollars thrown their way, for the past six months or so, the space seemed to cool down considerably as many hunkered down and tried to execute their business plans and secure ad dollars to validate their respective strategies. I'd have to think one of the cautionary points listed in all of these business plans was an aggressive move by the true undisputed king of sports media, ESPN, of course into HS sports. The caution is now a reality. Last week, ESPN quietly announced the formation of ESPN Rise, a new multimedia franchise for the home of high school sports. Unlike many of the other players in the space, ESPN enters with a slew properties and buying options for advertisers. Later this summer, ESPN will unveil ESPNRISE.com, its online hub for HS Sports featuring social networking applications and content from several brands and partners including Scouts. On the magazine front, the worldwide leader in sports has put all of its niche titles including Gridiron all under the Rise franchise and will have a reported combined circulation of one million. On the on-air front, Rise will work with ESPN's college outpost, ESPNU with an expectation of a possible spin-off if there is traction. With almost immediate scale and the backing of the leading sports media brand, the inevitable shake out in the HS sports space probably just got moved up by a year and the emphasis will be shifted back to the upstarts like Takkle, beRecruited and others to show some immediate results.

A Comeback Of Sorts For Major League Baseball

After several years of steady viewership declines and live attendance, Major League Baseball appears poised for bump upwards based on our latest Insights immersion among teens and college students. It's a welcome sign for America's pastime as professional and college football and basketball remain as popular as ever while new outposts, led mainly by mixed martial arts as well as action sports to a lesser degree have done a much better job of marketing themselves to the core 13 to 24 year old male target. So, why the up tick all of the sudden for stodgy old MLB. Very simply, it looks to be their interactive offerings. The newly fashion MLB site is considerably more robust in terms of its interactive offerings and applications than all previous versions put together. Clearly, MLB's digital media team was spot on. The site recently eclipsed the NBA's online outpost to become the second most visited professional sport's league site, behind only the NFL.  38% of teens and college students consider themselves to be a fan of MLB, up from 35% last year. 36% say they have a favorite MLB team, up slightly from 34% last year. Based on respondent feedback, we also expect an up tick in viewership during summer break. 22% said they plan to watch at least one MLB game per month this summer, up from 20% last year and 14% said they plan to watch five or more games this summer, up from 11% last year. In terms of live attendance, 12%, up from 9% last year plan to attend at least one game and 6% say they plan on attending three or more games this summer, up from 4% last year.  Though it pales in comparison to fantasy football, participation in baseball fantasy leagues is up slightly to 9% after two straight years of no growth. Finally, in terms of the most popular MLB players, no real surprises here, with Yankee star Derek Jeter taking top honors receiving the most number of mentions, followed by another Yankee, Alex Rodriguez with Albert Pujols, Josh Beckett and David Wright rounding out the top five. 

Can Under Armour Really Take On Nike?

Without a doubt one the big stories playing out this year in the sports apparel and footwear category will focus on Under Armour's entrance into the athletic trainer category, a category long dominated by Nike. By now we all now the humble beginnings of the Maryland-based company--launched by a UM student who was seeking a new kind of "performance" gear, and the rest is history. Essentially, Under Armour created a new category that was received exceptionally well by the market, the target being young athletes mostly between the ages of 12 and 24. It's hard to attend a high school or college practice of a football, soccer, baseball, wrestling--whatever, and not see a decent number of those kids wearing Under Armour gear. If you look back a few years, it seems like they kind of caught the behemoths off guard a bit and created a nice little niche for themselves. Perhaps Nike should have tried to acquire them five year ago? Who knows, may be they did try and were denied. Now comes the next step and the biggest challenge to date for a company that is yet to break the billion dollar sales barrier, conquering the athletic trainer category. It's a bold move to say the least. Being a public company, UA is under intense pressure from shareholders and the investment community to grow. They already own about half the market for performance gear and as we first mentioned about six months ago, they've been making substantial strides in the women's performance category. It's almost like they didn't have any other choice but to enter an entirely new category to stimulate aggressive growth. In an Applesque mystique, UA will introduce their new line of trainers this Sunday with their first ever 60 second spot during the Super Bowl. That's a big deal for a company that has a limited media spend compared to Nike or Adidas. Hoopla aside, the real question is whether UA can gain traction in the category and how fast the traction will come. So, that said, here's our prediction...if the new trainers can parallel the unique characteristics of their apparel line, it's not unreasonable to think UA won't capture at least a 25% share of the athletic trainer market within two years. If the new line doesn't offer that same type of innovation widely seen in their apparel line, then perhaps running that multimillion dollar spot during the biggest television event of the year wasn't such a smart move after all. We'll see.

2008 Market Trends: Club and Intramural Sports

We start our list of 10 trends for 2008 looking at club and intramural sports. The real beauty behind club and intramural sports for young people is that they are one part athletic competition and perhaps even more important, one part social activity and get together amongst friends. The macro active health and wellness trend we've spoken about for the past year and half has infiltrated club and intramural sports. Participation among students has grown by over 25% since 2005. We believe club and intramural sports represent a unique localized sponsorship opportunity for brand marketers and media companies looking to reach and ultimately engage the college aged audience. According to our latest research, the top club and intramural sports played include flag football, soccer, softball, ultimate frisbee and ping pong. The somewhat intimate setting for intramurals present branding, sampling and event opportunities. There are also ways to tie sponsorship back to the online world via Facebook. At schools across the country, player/managers set up schedules and times using Facebook's immensely popular Event tool, which can customized for a particular brand. Sponsorship in this space is the opposite of static so lots of legwork and preliminary research will need to be completed before one can get started, but at the end of the day, we strongly believe a sponsored program utilizing this popular and growing activity will deliver superior results compared to other forms of traditional media.

Another HS Sports Site Gets Snatched Up

Wow, talk about a red hot category. Dealmaking in the online high school sports space has been on a tear since the start of this year. The latest announcement comes from beRecruited.com. The paidcontent blog reports that beRecruited has been acquired by the privaty equity firm RVS Ventures, headed up by former Student Advantage CEO Ray Sozzi. Financial terms of the acquisition were not released. As part of the acquisition, Sozzi will become CEO of the high school sports site. Not unlike CBS-owned MaxPreps or Hearst-owned High School Playbook, beRecruited attempts to connect student athletes and high school coaches with college coaches. Yes the field is crowded with different players and their will most certainly be some sort of shake out. The site with the best value proposition, not to mention target reach will win the game. As one of the smaller players, beRecruited says it has more than 125,000 registered student athletes to go along with 8,000 registered college coaches and 3,000 registered high school coaches.  It will be exciting to see what happens next, but clearly there are several options available in the marketplace for brand marketers and media companies targeting the college-bound high school demographic.