Digital Media Content Consumption Posts 15% Gain

Digital media content consumption continued steady mid-double-digit percentage gains in August.

Pivotal Media Research analysis of Nielsen August 2018 data shows growth in the consumption of digital content on PCs, tablets and mobile handsets of 15% to 34 billion person-hours -- similar to the low double-digit hikes in periods prior to April of this year.

Industry leader Google remains higher, with second-place Facebook showing erosion, writes Brian Wieser, senior research analyst at Pivotal, in analyzing Nielsen’s Digital Content Ratings (DCR).

Google’s YouTube, Google and Waze combined to account for 32.8% of digital media consumption, up from 29.4% in August 2017. Google-related properties accounted for 56% of the growth in overall consumption of digital content.

YouTube continues to grow 20% or more gains. Alone, YouTube accounts for 18% of all digital content consumption. Taking out YouTube from overall industry-wide digital content results, equate to a 12% improvement.

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Facebook, which includes Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp, was down to 14.3% of all digital consumption in August 2018; it was 16.9% in August 2017 and 18.5% in August 2016. Pivotal says while the number of core Facebook users were up 7.2%, the average time per person was down 6.7%. Total company-wide usage decline was 13.0%.

After Google and Facebook, Verizon properties were the third-largest platform of digital content time spent. Including Yahoo, AOL and Tumblr (but excluding MSN inventory), Verizon had a 3.2% share of digital media content consumption against. 3.5% in August 2017.

Next was Amazon. Looking at all activity -- including Twitch and Audible -- it was at a1.8% share against  2.1% in August 2017.

Snap was also lower: 1.5% in August 2018 versus 1.8% in August 2017. Wieser says this does not include younger-skewing audience base -- under 18 -- which “could have a more significant impact on the company’s overall usage trends.”

Still, Snap shows growth in monthly users 20% higher. Time spent on Snap fell 23%, the fifth consecutive month to do so.

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