Thoughts and remarks on a paper by Matthew Gentzkow (2014) « Trading dollars for dollars: the price of attention online and offline » AEA papers and proceedings. My own paper "Media dwell time" does tell that one minute consumption of a given medium is not equal to one minute of attention to another one when it comes to ad absorption. Just because attention value is not the same !

1. Trading minutes for minutes?
Thoughts and remarks on a paper by Matthew Gentzkow (2014)
« Trading dollars for dollars: the price of attention online and
offline » AEA papers and proceedings, vol. 104 n°5

2. Based on « Trading dollars for dollars »
« the price of attention in
traditional media has fallen as the
Internet has made advertising markets
increasingly competitive »
« the price of attention for similar
consumers is actually higher online
than offline»
Source: Matthew Gentzkow “Trading Dollars for Dollars: The Price of Attention Online and Offline”
in American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings. 104 (5). May 2014. pp,481-488.
http://faculty.chicagobooth.edu/matthew.gentzkow/research/DollarsForDollars.pdf

3. The so-called « price of attention »
Media Minutes per person per day Advertising revenue per hour
2008 2012 Evolution 2008 2012 Evolution
Newspapers
Print 9.54 8.24 -14% $ 2.78 $ 1.57 -44%
Online 0.63 0.54 -14% $ 3.79 $ 4.24 12%
Internet 26.12 37.17 42% $ 0.68 $ 0.68 0%
Magazines 3.95 3.64 -8% $ 2.58 $ 2.07 -20%
Television 205.4 209.8 2% $ 0.27 $ 0.26 -4%
Source: Matthew Gentzkow « Trading dollars for dollars: the price of attention online
and offline » p.485
« Minutes per person per day is for American adults 18 and older. Advertising revenue per hour is total amount
advertising revenue divided by total annual minutes in 2012 dollars »

4. Not a bit dangerous ?

5. Dubious assumptions
Empirical evidence that ½ of concurrent
minutes is the right way when
multitasking does increase?
« Average minutes per day as
minutes of exclusive use
plus half ‘for simplicity’ of minutes concurrent with other activities »
Validation ?
«For print newspapers and magazines […] implicitly fixing reading
time per copy at the 2008 value »
Above all:
is exclusive media usage
synonymous with attention ?

6. Ad absorption after 30 minutes of
controlled, exclusive use of media
% of ads correctly recalled vs ads exposed in two
14%
30%
40%
37%
75%
75%
Television
Television
Newspapers
Magazines
Internet
Internet
separate (US & BE) experiments
More on: http://www.slideshare.net/Bernard_Cools/30minutesfor-slideshare

7. Minutes for minutes does not work !
% of ads correctly recalled vs ads exposed in two
14%
30%
40%
37%
Television
Television
Newspapers
Magazines
Internet
More on: http://www.slideshare.net/Bernard_Cools/30minutesfor-slideshare
75%
75%
Internet
separate (US & BE) experiments

8. Nevertheless « Trading dollars for dollars » tells
a lot on media consumption
& advertising investments

9. What the data do tell us on media usage
Actually change in circulation *
Media Minutes per person per day Advertising revenue per hour
2008 2012 Evolution 2008 2012 Evolution
Similar evolution
Newspapers
Print 9.54 8.24 -14% $ 2.78 $ 1.57 -44%
Online 0.63 0.54 -14% $ 3.79 $ 4.24 12%
Internet 26.12 37.17 42% $ 0.68 $ 0.68 0%
Magazines 3.95 3.64 -8% $ 2.58 $ 2.07 -20%
Television 205.4 209.8 2% $ 0.27 $ 0.26 -4%
Online newspapers evolution
different from Web in general !
Change in circulation *
In spite of a heavy increase of
Web exclusive usage *,
consumption relatively stable
+6% cumulated time spent
Source: Matthew Gentzkow « Trading dollars for dollars: the price of attention online
and offline » p.485
« Minutes per person per day is for American adults 18 and older.
* See above

10. What the data do tell us on ad invest
Media Minutes per person per day Advertising revenue per hour
Reports of decrease: ad
2008 2012 Evolution 2008 2012 Evolution
market overreacts
Newspapers
Print Losses 9.54 in paper ad 8.24 revenue
-14% $ 2.78 $ 1.57 -44%
Online not balanced 0.63 by online 0.54 gains
-14% $ 3.79 $ 4.24 12%
Internet 26.12 37.17 42% $ 0.68 $ 0.68 0%
Magazines 3.95 3.64 -8% $ 2.58 $ 2.07 -20%
Television 205.4 209.8 2% $ 0.27 $ 0.26 -4%
Seems the overall media
allocation remains unchanged
or decreases globally
>40% up in 4-5 years !
Source: Matthew Gentzkow « Trading dollars for dollars: the price of attention online
and offline » p.485
« Minutes per person per day is for American adults 18 and older. Advertising revenue per hour is total amount
advertising revenue divided by total annual minutes in 2012 dollars »

11. Contradictory to Gentzkow’s statements:
one minute of media use ≠ one minute of
another media use
when it comes to attention
It seems the ad market (not only US…) flows into
Internet, forgetting the confirmed marketing
attractiveness of « old media », especially print
In times of recession, overall media investment
does not grow, only the media shares change 