8 June 2009

People whom friends seek out for advice on a range of products and purchases, from food to fashion and home wares, are themselves more likely to seek out magazines than other media options for their ideas and information.  

According to the latest Word of Mouth data in the Morgan readership survey, Trusted Advisers across a spectrum of product segments are much more inclined to be users of magazines than other media.  

This provides advertisers with a powerful opportunity to influence the WoM process by communicating the benefits of their products and brands through the pages of magazines.   

• Frequent, or heavy, magazine readers are 31 percent more likely to be Trusted Advisers on new food products, indexing at 131. Other heavy media users index in line with, or lower than, the population average, with newspapers scoring lowest (index 92).  
• Advice givers on new supermarket products are 27 percent more likely to be magazine readers (index 127), the highest scoring medium by a wide margin.   
• Health and nutrition advisers lean more towards magazines (117) and the internet (112) than other media, with heavy commercial TV users the least likely to be sought for health advice (83).  
• Magazines are the medium of choice for Trusted Advisers on fashion (129) and cosmetics (139). The internet is the next highest scorer, indexing 112 and 113 respectively, with other media lagging in importance.  
• After heavy users of the internet (index score 132), heavy magazine readers (111) and commercial radio listeners (108) are the next most inclined groups to be Trusted Advisers on mobile phone purchases.  
• Home decorating advisers are more likely to be magazine readers (121) than users of other media, with heavy TV viewers the lowest scorers (88).