Part 2: Digital Communications and Digital Influence Index Study

In the second part of his presentation, Dave Senay talked about new communication trends with focus on digital and interactive communications. He finished this part with a presentation of results of a recent digital study. Working in cooperation with Harris Interactive, Fleishman-Hillard Research interviewed nearly 5,000 internet users in the United Kingdom, Germany, and France.
What is the study about? In less than a generation, the Internet has clearly become part of the consumers’ daily lives. But what impact does it really have on how they live? And how important a role does it play in their daily decisions?

Key findings of the study:

• The internet has ten times the influence of traditional print media on the average consumer in surveyed countries. This shift in consumer influence indicates a need and an opportunity for companies to reprioritize the mix of communications channels they use to reach their customers.
• Consumers use the internet in different ways to make different decisions. For example, consumers are more likely to seek opinions of others through social media and product-rating sites when making choices that have a great deal of personal impact (e.g., healthcare options or major electronics purchases). But they do use company-controlled sources when making transactional decisions on commoditized items, such as utilities or airline tickets.
• While consumers see the clear benefits of the internet on their lives, they continue to have concerns about internet safety and the trustworthiness of some online information. In the UK, for example, 66% of online consumers say the internet helps them make better decisions, but just 28% trust the information companies provide on the internet.

See detailed survey overview: http://www.fhdigital.net/InfluenceIndex/

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