LOVE & LIVE in HIS PURPOSE

1 out of 5 readers of DC Comics are FEMALE

Still running the numbers on DC Comics survey.  Female readers:

7% of 167 (most lame national/international survey stat ever) is 12

7% of 600 is 42

23% of 5000 is 1150

Total number of female reader surveys 1,204

Total number of surveys 5,767

1204/5767 is 20.88%

So more than 1 out of 5 readers of DC new 52 comics are FEMALES.  That’s a hell of a difference than the 7 out of 100, DC’s been touting.

Numbers courtesy of John Rood, VP of Sales, Marketing and Business Development in Publishers Weekly article.

Leave it to a woman …

“[DC Entertainment president] Diane Nelson was really the one who said, bully for you undertaking the New 52, but let’s from the get go have some sense of measurement to confirm what we all speculate on. And she’s taken that research imperative across our company. We have a business that is in publishing but also in media and merchandising. And when we work across the three brands of DC Comics Vertigo and Mad, as you can imagine there’s much to be reached to be more strategic some of these things we launch.” — John Rood, VP of Sales, Marketing and Business Development at DC Comics

Yep, it takes a woman to tell the boys that they should measure their success or failure AND NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS THAT THEY ARE RIGHT ALL THE TIME!!!

Reading the Rood … (DC Comics Survey Results)

In the Publisher’s Weekly interview with DC Comics’ John Rood.  The VP of Sales, Marketing and Business Development explains the survey.

There were three groups surveyed:

#1 surveys conducted in-store customers in comic book shops

#2 online readers, via a survey anyone could take if they purchased a new 52 comic

#3 digital download customers via a survey sent to users of DC’s own app and comiXology

Survey was conducted by Nielsen in September and October when new 52 #1s were getting underway.  

#1 group (in-store) had 167 surveys completed.  If a new 52 #1 in first printing sold 190,000 copies, then that is 0.08% of 1% of that issue’s sales.  This is by no means a reasonable sample set to be deriving any kind of statistics.  If DC only received 167 in-store surveys within the US or internationally, then that is WEAK and totally irrelevant as a means to make any analysis.

#3 group (digital downloads) fared a little better with about 600 surveys completed.  This is 0.3% of 1% using the same size of number sold as in the group #1.  Anything less than 1% is not conducive to any analysis or assumptions.

Rood uses these two groups to state that “group 1 and group 3—those were both 93-7 in male/female skew.”  No statistics can be derived from such low sample sets.  A reasonable sample set based on the 190,000 number would be 7,600 which is a mere 4% of the example’s number sold.

#2 group (online survey of readers who purchased a new 52) had about 5,000 surveys completed.  This is a sample size of 2.63% of the example’s number sold.  Not the best sample size, but it’s the more statistically sound derived from any of these survey venues.  It had a 77-23 male/female skew.  This would be the most reasonable statistic to concentrate on since the sample size was larger and derived from a more public forum.  Casting a wider net to find the catch of readers.

But Rood’s comment is baffling.  Does he concentrate on the one group that gave him a larger census?  Apparently not.  

“So was there a glut of activity specific to wanting to register certain feedback? I can’t say whether females found their voice in that survey or whether they had specific female related issues to report on, but this is something that stood out.”

Or maybe females felt more comfortable taking the online survey when they actually BUY and READ your comics?   That could mean marketing to females online might help DC Comics and the industry as a whole.  

But no, Rood pushed the 93% male stats stating it just proved they were right about their audience all along.  Which is bogus analysis.

The survey as a whole did not give anyone enough information to make any real analysis.  And the one stat from the largest consensus was ignored or at least not promoted as being viable.