Mitt Romney is Still 'The Leader of the Pack' in Campaign Advertising, Nielsen Reports

Iowa Remains Focus for Local Ads

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in Tight Race for Most Visitors to

Campaign Web Sites

    NEW YORK, Oct. 15 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- So far this year,
 Republican Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney has placed more political ads
 than any other two presidential candidates combined, The Nielsen Company
 reported today. Altogether, Romney placed 10,893 political ads from January
 1 to October 10, 2007, compared to 5,975 for Bill Richardson and 4,293 for
 Barack Obama, the two runners-up.
     Nielsen also reported:
 
      * Almost 95% of the total 28,725 presidential campaign ads placed this
        year were on local television, and over 71% of those were placed in
        Iowa.
 
      * During the month of August, HillaryClinton.com (759,000) and
        BarackObama.com (749,000) continued to be in a tight race for the most
        unique visitors to their campaign Web sites.
 
      * Hillary Clinton generated the most "Buzz" in online blog discussions.
        On the Republican side, both Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney experienced
        increases, but the rate was outpaced by the growth in buzz about Fred
        Thompson, who officially entered the race during the quarter.
     Nielsen measures television and radio advertisements through Nielsen
 Monitor-Plus, Internet advertising through Nielsen//NetRatings and blog and
 other consumer-generated media activity through Nielsen BuzzMetrics.
     Democrats Outpace GOP in Traditional Media
 
      * Overall, the Democrats have taken the lead in running Presidential
        campaign advertising.  The Democratic candidates have run a total of
        16,683 television advertising spots compared to 12,042 spots by the
        Republican candidates.
 
      * Hillary Clinton has only run half as many ads as Richardson or Obama,
        but has spread her advertising around in many more states.
 
      * With nearly 11,000 ads, Romney has far outpaced his Republican rivals.
        John McCain, for example, has run 166 local ads, all in New Hampshire,
        and Fred Thompson has run 13 ads, all on national cable.  Both McCain
        and Thompson have only recently started running spots, with their ads
        airing since September.
 
      * Rudy Giuliani continues his strategy of running ads exclusively on
        radio with a total of 642 spots airing during this time period.
 
 
      2008 Presidential Campaign Television and Radio Spots for Democrats
      (TV = Jan 1, 2007 - Oct 10, 2007; Radio = Jan 1, 2007 - Sep 2, 2007)
 
     Media/Market    Bill        Chris     Barack    Hillary   John     Joe
                     Richardson  Dodd      Obama     Clinton   Edwards  Biden
 
     Total TV & Radio   5,975    2,960     4,293     2,192       550      713
     Radio                161                 49
     National Cable                  4
 
     Total Local TV     5,814    2,956     4,244     2,192       550      713
     Iowa               5,225    2,259     4,038     1,662        45      659
     New Hampshire        584      697       177       352       481
     North Carolina                           10        12
     Florida                                   1
     Tennessee                                          31
     Washington DC                                                24
     Arizona                                            16
     Pennsylvania                             16        12                  6
     California             1                           12
     Louisiana                                          17
     Nevada                                             12
     Missouri                                           14
     New York                                           29
     Kentucky                                            1                 48
     Virginia                                           12
     Other                  4                  2        10
 
     Source:  Nielsen Monitor-Plus
 
 
 
     2008 Presidential Campaign Television and Radio Spots for Republicans
      (TV = Jan 1, 2007 - Oct 10, 2007; Radio = Jan 1, 2007 - Sep 2, 2007)
 
 
     Media/Market    Mitt   Rudy      Ron   John    Hunter   Fred      Tom
                     Romney Giuliani  Paul  McCain  Duncan   Thompson  Tancredo
 
     Total TV &
      Radio          10,893   642     231    166       88       13        9
     Radio              397   642                                         9
     National Cable     297                                     13
 
     Total Local TV  10,199           231    166       88
     Iowa             5,058           231              54
     New Hampshire    1,678                  166
     Vermont            977
     South
      Carolina          893                            22
     Florida          1,413
     Georgia             96
     Michigan            68
     California                                        12
     Other               16
 
     Source: Nielsen Monitor-Plus
     Online Race to the White House
     Over the past several months, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have
 been vying for the most popular presidential campaign Web site. This
 summer, Clinton led in June, Obama led in July and Clinton pulled ahead
 again in August, with 759,000 unique visitors. Obama followed close behind,
 with 749,000 unique visitors. John Edwards rounded out the top three
 campaign sites with 448,000 unique visitors.
     Relative newcomer Fred Thompson took the No. 4 spot among all
 candidates in August and was the online leader among Republicans with
 410,000 unique visitors to Fred08.com. Fellow Republicans Mitt Romney and
 Ron Paul followed with 291,000 and 210,000 unique visitors, respectively.
     Presidential Campaign Web Sites* for August 2007 (U.S., Home and Work)
 
 
     Site                                    Unique Visitors     Web Page Views
                                                        (000)            (000)
     HillaryClinton.com                                  759            3,283
     BarackObama.com                                     749            9,910
     JohnEdwards.com                                     448            1,955
     Fred08.com                                          410            1,437
     MittRomney.com                                      291            1,457
     RonPaul2008.com                                     208              611
     ChrisDodd.com**                                     177              203
     JoinRudy2008.com                                    151            3,697
     MikeHuckabee.com**                                  123              461
     RichardsonForPresident.com**                        103            1,190
     JohnMcCain.com**                                     58              193
     Dennis4president.com**                               52            1,715
 
     Source: Nielsen//NetRatings
 
       * Minimum of 50,000 unique visitors
      ** These Web sites do not meet minimum sample size standards. Projected
         and average measures for these sites may exhibit large changes month-
         to-month as a result.
     Despite low Web traffic, John McCain continues to lead the presidential
 contenders in online advertising, with 4.3 million sponsored link
 impressions in August. Dennis Kucinich ranked No. 2 with 1.8 million
 sponsored links, followed by Mitt Romney and Hillary Clinton with 1.7
 million and 522,000 sponsored link impressions in August, respectively.
    Online Political Campaign Advertising, Sponsored Links in August (U.S.)
 
     Candidate                                  Sponsored Link
                                                Impressions (000)
     John McCain                                   4,316
     Kucinich for President Committee              1,822
     Romney for President, Inc.                    1,731
     Friends of Hillary                              522
 
     Source: Nielsen//NetRatings
 
     Buzz Worthy Candidates
     Hillary Clinton continues to lead in online buzz, generating the most
 online mentions in blogs for the third quarter. Fred Thompson, who
 announced his candidacy on The Tonight Show and on his website, experienced
 the greatest growth in mentions, increasing 526 percent compared to the
 first quarter. Mentions of Republican candidates Mitt Romney and Rudy
 Giuliani also grew during the quarter, while mentions of John McCain
 slipped.
        Presidential Candidates' Average Monthly Share of Blog Citations
 
     Candidate          Q1 2007      Q2 2007       Q3 2007      Q1 to Q3
                        average      average       average       change
     Hillary             0.05%        0.05%         0.05%          0%
     Clinton
     John Edwards        0.04%        0.03%         0.03%        -20%
     Fred Thompson       0.00%        0.02%         0.03%        526%
     Mitt Romney         0.02%        0.03%         0.03%         35%
     Rudy Giuliani       0.02%        0.03%         0.02%         45%
     John McCain         0.03%        0.04%         0.02%        -27%
     Barack Obama        0.03%        0.02%         0.02%        -33%
     Joe Biden           0.01%        0.01%         0.01%          0%
 
 
     Source: Nielsen BuzzMetrics
     About The Nielsen Company
     The Nielsen Company is a global information and media company with
 leading market positions and recognized brands in marketing information
 (ACNielsen), media information including mobile media (Nielsen Media
 Research), business publications (Billboard, The Hollywood Reporter,
 Adweek), trade shows and online information. The privately held company is
 active in more than 100 countries, with headquarters in Haarlem, the
 Netherlands and New York, USA. For more information, please visit,
 www.nielsen.com.
 
 

SOURCE The Nielsen Company