Selected Case Studies

Times Online is constantly seeking ways both to increase the number of visitors to its site and to provide them with opportunities to engage interactively with multimedia content.

During the 2006 Party Conference season, Times Online used the Populus Message Meter to allow visitors to pass their second-by-second judgement on the highlights of Tony Blair’s last Party Leader’s speech to a Labour Conference and David Cameron’s first Leader’s speech to the Conservatives.

Linking through to the Populus Message Meter from Times Online’s Comment Central blog just a few hours after both leaders’ speeches, visitors were asked some basic questions about themselves. They were then shown a short package of speech highlights and asked to register their approval or disapproval of what they were seeing as the clips were playing.

Once people had completed the questionnaire and given their second-by-second response to the speeches, they were able to view the latest aggregate results in real time. And see how responses had differed according to voting intention and gender. These responses were made available to all Times Online visitors in the days that followed.

To view the Message Meter, and the reaction of Times Online readers to David Cameron's first conference speech as party leader, please click here.