McD’s to sneak-peek Power Rangers’ new look

Showing no signs of slowing down on-screen or in toy aisles, Disney’s 12-year-old Power Rangers franchise will preview its next incarnation, Power Rangers DinoThunder, in a December McDonald’s Happy Meal program featuring eight toy premiums. Master toy licensee Bandai will trickle out a sampling of the new DinoThunder toys in mid-December, with the full line launching in January. A new TV series will debut at the same time on ABC Family.

Yahoo! and ACNeilsen measure the impact of web advertising

The question of whether web ads are effective at driving retail sales has always been a bit nebulous, and many marketers have shied away from the medium as a result. But Yahoo and ACNeilsen have teamed up to shed some light on the subject with a new research service called Consumer Direct. Between 15,000 and 17,000 U.S. consumers who are members of ACNielsen’s 61,500-household Homescan panel (they scan all the products they buy in stores) and Yahoo! users have signed up. They will let analysts correlate their off-line spending habits with on-line activity and web ad views. The Consumer Direct team will use the findings to help its packaged goods clients (including Kraft Foods and Unilever) create customized on-line marketing campaigns that deliver greater ROI.

Kids and moms hit the web for back-to-school

Back-to-school shopping promos are driving a serious uptick in traffic to on-line retail websites run by companies like Old Navy, Scholastic and Wal-Mart. Seven of the top-10 fastest-growing retail sites for the week of August 3, 2003 (as measured by Neilsen//NetRatings) are running special back-to-school areas featuring sales and special offers on their home pages.

Site — Unique Audience (‘000s) — Growth — 7/27/03 to 8/3/03

Smartbargains.com — 337 — 1.04 — 209%

Old Navy * — 297 — 614 — 109%

Buy.com * — 680 — 1.24 — 83%

ABC Distributing — 189 — 346 — 83%

iWon Shopping * — 180 — 290 –61%

Scholastic * — 179 — 279 — 56%

Wal-Mart Stores * — 1.5 — 2.2 — 45%

Sam’s Club * — 348 — 487 — 37%

Bedandbathbeyond.com — 258 — 352 — 36%

Victoriassecret.com — 264 — 359 — 36%

* These sites are running special back-to-school areas on their home pages

Source: Nielsen//NetRatings August 2003