Understanding SOV (Share of Voice)

Understanding SOV (Share of Voice)

By Christopher Knight

DEFINITION:

SOV = Share of Voice. The total percentage that you possess of the particular niche, market, or audience you are targeting.

Example: There are 100,000 businesses in the same industry as your list or ezine services. You have 10,000 members on your list. It could be argued that your SOV is 10% of that industry if your list specifically serves that niche.

Another way of looking at Share of Voice: (according to ADVBL.com)
"Secondary market research is used to accumulate measured media expenditures and estimated costs for other communications activities. Information should be gathered for all competitors on a regular (quarterly and/or annual) basis. Each competitor's percentage of the aggregate total is its Share-of-Voice."

Why does knowing your SOV matter? Answer = Because with email newsletters and discussion lists, it is a strong selling point to advertisers when you can tell them that you are reaching a 40-90% share of a particular market niche that is of value to them (depending on what your SOV is). If reaching a high percentage of their target market is important, this will endear them to you and possibly increase their level of advertising with your list(s).
How do you find out what the total size of your niche is?

Almost every industry has a research report that you can buy from the big dogs, such as Forrestor, Yankee, etc. You might also find relevant stats on your niche from press releases or sales literature from organizations that already bought the reports and are publishing how big the niche is that they are looking to dominate.

This Ezine-Tip was submitted By Christopher Knight -- Email List Marketing Expert, author and entrepreneur. Get your weekly dose of Email newsletter publishing, marketing, promotion, management, email-etiquette, email usability and deliverability tips by joining the free Ezine-Tips newsletter: http://www.emailuniverse.com/subscribe/.


Press advertising means placement of organization's advertisements in press. The press usually includes newspapers (daily national), newspapers local, newspapers local free and magazines.


Advertisements are subdivided into display advertising, semi-display advertising, advertorials, loose inserts and classified advertising. The choice of media, type of advertisement, its position, size, frequency and etc., largely depends upon the objectives of the advertising campaign. Press advertising is often used in pull and profile strategies and is characterized by medium targeting, very low cost per contact, fast speed of response, low percentage of response and high response volume that makes it a perfect tool if a company needs to raise awareness, generate leads, boost store traffic or direct sales and support other promotional activities.

There are quite a number of indicators that help to measure press advertising activities, for example, CPT (cost per thousand), reach, frequency, awareness, SOV (share of voice) and others. However, they differ in relevance and application. As to application, the indicators may be subdivided into those required at planning stage, those required for control and those that can be used at the both stages.

Thus, with regard to planning there should be mentioned CPT (cost per thousand), SOV (share of voice), reach, frequency and OTS (opportunity to see). These indicators allow for budgeting, campaign planning and cross-comparison across different media types and media vehicles. They may be used independently, though complex approach yields better results. The data for their calculations is usually easily obtained. For example, most of the media make researches of their readership and provide the customers with their results. This information makes the calculation of reach and CPT an easy task. SOV, even for competitors, may be calculated in-house as well or it may be outsourced to the specialized agency. In either case the main decision-making factors are budget and degree of precision. The calculations are also relatively easy and do not require a lot of expertise. As to the relevance, the most relevant for press advertising campaign planning are reach and frequency that create the necessary OTS and define the budget. CPC and SOV may be regarded as additional indicators: CPC for media choice, SOV for budget decisions.
Among the indicators used at the stage of control there are Awareness Growth, Cost pr ad /Sv (cost of press advertising to sales volume ratio), Cost pr ad /Sn (cost of press advertising to sales number ratio), CPC/GI (Cost per contact to Growth in inquiries %) and all indicators with internal perspective that allow for control over activities of advertising and marketing departments. The control procedures over advertising campaign in press always present a certain issue, largely because sales and revenues are not directly related to advertising. The advertising in press directly influences awareness, knowledge, perception etc. that, as a rule, can be measured with a help of specialized research. However, the above-mentioned indicators reveal trends and therefore may be considered as additional means of control, especially when direct means are somehow unavailable. Most of the information can be obtained within the organization and the calculations are not difficult as well.

The indicators that could be used at both stages are those connected with awareness, SOV and other measures where input and output values are important for advertising campaign evaluation and market trends analysis.