Online media play a greater role in purchase decisions than television and print advertising, at least for certain products, according to a study from DoubleClick.
In eight out of 10 categories, company Web sites placed among the four most often-cited sources of information consulted by consumers.
Corporate and third-party Web sites beat television and print ads in the travel, automotive, telecom, bank/credit card, mortgage and investment product, electronics and home product areas. They were near print and TV in the prescription drug category, and lagged significantly for movies and personal/home care products.
How do consumers find company Web sites? Mostly through search engines. But this was not true for movies, which often list a URL in their advertisements.
When DoubleClick lumped all online channels — Web advertising, search engines, e-mail and Web sites — into a single category, they easily outranked salespeople, word of mouth, in-store promotions and television advertisements as purchase influencers.
The chart gives the percentage of respondents who said that an online channel “most influenced” their purchase decisions, by product type. Separately, 75% of all prescription drug buyers were most influenced by their doctor, and over half of all home improvement buyers said they “saw it in the store.”
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