1. The IPA Databank study 2017: Methodology
Business effectiveness
Analysis of UK IPA effectiveness case studies
This study looks at the recent business effectiveness of UK print and digital newsbrands. It cannot be compared with similar studies that analyse media effectiveness across the entire global database since 1980.
Peter Field analysed 108 UK cases from the IPA effectiveness awards databank, (52% of all entries for this period), to look at the business effectiveness of UK newsbrands. Total cases = 84 using newsbrands, compared with 24 non-users:
57 using print
71 using digital newsbrands
44 using both print and digital newsbrands
All data is based on reported “very large” business effects.

2. The IPA databank study: methodology
The data used in this analysis comes from the IPA Effectiveness Awards, a bank of case studies demonstrating the commercial effectiveness of advertising
The data used in this analysis of the IPA databank is claimed business (hard) effects. The business effects data includes an assessment of a wide range of changes resulting from a campaign: sales and share gains, price sensitivity, customer loyalty, penetration and profit
The scale of a business effect is assessed by the case study author (in the compulsory questionnaire filled in by all IPA Effectiveness Awards entrants) as being ‘very large’, ‘large/substantial’ or ‘small/negligible’. In this analysis only ‘very large’ effects are included - previous analysis by Les Binet and Peter Field for IPA Datamine 2 showed there was a high correlation between very large business effects and ROI:
Campaigns reporting any very large business effects reported 620% average ROI vs 390% for campaigns not reporting very large business effects
The correlation between the number of very large business effects and market share gain is very strong: significant at the 99% confidence level
The IPA Databank is a collection of successful case studies – the effectiveness success rates are therefore generally high. What is important is not their absolute level, but the relative levels achieved by different media combinations
Source: IPA Databank UK case studies (52% of all cases)

3. Definitions and sample sizes
108 UK cases analysed
(excludes 59 international, 32 not-for-profit and 8 UK cases with incomplete data):
Newsbrand print users 57
Non-users 51
Newsbrand digital users 71
Non-users 37
Newsbrand print + digital users 44
Non-users of both 24
Total newsbrand users 84
Non-users 24
Newsbrand print users:
more than 8% of budget
Newsbrand digital users:
more than 0.01% of budget
Non-users:
didn’t use/light or passing use
Peter Field looked at the most recent cases in the IPA databank so we could get a clear picture of the impact of newsbrands in the modern media environment, where digital and social platforms are adequately represented as well as the more traditional media.
This study looks at business effectiveness of UK print and digital newsbrands for It cannot be compared with similar studies that analyse media effectiveness across the entire global database since 1980.
There are too few complete non-users of newsbrand media amongst IPA case studies, but fortunately there are a good number of campaigns that made light or passing use of newsbrand media. We have called these “non-users”. All not-for profit cases were excluded.
These are compared with ‘users’ who have spent over the following thresholds:
8% of total media budget for print newsbrands
0.01% of total budget for digital newsbrands
In total, 84 cases were included, broken down as shown.
Analysis focused on very large business effects only.
The scale of a business effect is assessed by the case study author (in the compulsory questionnaire filled in by all IPA Effectiveness Awards entrants) as being ‘very large’, ‘large/substantial’ or ‘small/negligible’. In this analysis only ‘very large’ effects are included - previous analysis by Les Binet and Peter Field for IPA Datamine 2 showed there was a high correlation between very large business effects and ROI:
Campaigns reporting any very large business effects reported 620% average ROI vs 390% for campaigns not reporting very large business effects
The correlation between the number of very large business effects and market share gain is very strong: significant at the 99% confidence level
Source: IPA Databank UK case studies (52% of all cases)

4. The IPA databank study: analysis
The analysis compares the number of very large business effects for campaigns that include newsbrands with campaigns that don’t include newsbrands. Platforms are also taken into account, eg
Figures for print newsbrands compare the number of very large business effects for campaigns that include a meaningful expenditure on print newsbrands (above the 8% threshold) with the number of very large business effects for campaigns that spent nothing, or a very small amount on print newsbrands
Results are shown as percentage differences between the number of very large business effects created by campaigns with and without newsbrands
Source: IPA Databank UK case studies (52% of all cases)