Tablet Owners Rule – Or Do They?

Taking a closer look at recent study results provides a more nuanced takeaway.

By Roy Beagley 10/31/2012 -05:16 PM

Many of you will have seen the recent comScore study that says, rather grandly, "40 percent of tablet owners read magazines at least once a month." On the face of it, this looks impressive—but is it?

I decided to take a closer look at the study's results, interested not so much in what was in the study, but what seems to have been left out. I may be wrong, but it seems to me these figures are a tad inconclusive.

The study says that 37.1 percent of tablet owners read a newspaper on their device at least once in August. So, 63.9 percent did not. Could the 63.9 percent have read a newspaper if they wanted to, did they prefer to read a paper version, could they even read? This seems important to me especially as potentially close to two-thirds of your market is ignoring you.

Of the 37.1 percent who read on their device at least once, how many times did they actually read a newspaper in any format? I think this is the more telling figure. For example, if you read the New York Times once in the month on your tablet, but the rest of the month you read the printed version, the printed version wins with a readership of 96.8 percent.

Now I know I have no way of proving this, but surely we need to know the reading habits of the 37.1 percent to decide whether this is an impressive figure or not. Going to the other extreme, if they only read the tablet once in the month and nothing else, then the readership is 100 percent, but this is not good either.

Digging deeper into the figures, we find that 11.5 percent of readers claimed to read almost every day. That means 89.5 percent (or 5,130 out of the 6,000 sampled) did not read daily and I cannot help wondering if these 5,130 preferred to pick up a newspaper. I don't know, I am not a mind reader, but this information seems important if I am to achieve an informed opinion.

The above figures are for newspapers. The figures for magazines are slightly higher at 39.6 percent but how conclusive is the information? For example, in August I read fourteen magazines in the month—four of The Week, four of The Spectator, four Economists and two T. V. Guides. In what format did I read them, I hear you cry? Well, for me, print, which sounds like a home run for the print team. But I don't have a tablet, so doesn't the figure become irrelevant?

The study is an interesting one and shows the future for tablets is bright, but a wise old circulation director (well, he seemed old at the time) once said to me "don't look on the positive side until you have looked into the negative side." So far that advice has served me well. 37.1 percent sounds good, but what of the 63.9 percent—this figure is just as telling. Maybe more so.

Roy Beagley is Director of Publishing Services for Tyson Associates Inc. Roy started his career at The Economist and then The Spectator in London. He moved to the United States in 1992 and since then he has worked with Tyson Associates handling many controlled and comsumer publications. He is editor of Circspot.com, a website for circulation and audience development professionals.