Number one!

Caution: blatant self-promotion ahead!

The big news this week is the annual McNair survey of IT readership in Australia has rated The Australian Financial Review’s IT section – the humble responsibility of yours truly – the number one daily publication for senior IT executives. Meanwhile, the AFR’s MIS Magazine, edited by Paul Smith and also overseen by yours truly, is the number one monthly magazine for senior IT executives.

It’s a very satisfying win for us on the MIS front, having toppled CIO Magazine after its very long run in the number one slot. And I’ll be bold enough to suggest that the AFR result is a great win because The Australian has been attempting to make hay from their recent wins at the annual MediaConnect Lizzie awards. It’s nice to se the record straight. To explain the difference between the Lizzies and the McNair report, the former is an award from media peers, the latter a survey of reader behaviour and opinion. While I’m a fan of Phil Sim’s work with the Lizzies, it almost goes without saying that the marketing types pay more attention to McNair.

ITJourno (a firewalled site for journos) had this to say in a story by Phil:

..the AusIT lost 18 percentage points on the expenditure metric and is now read by 19 per cent of senior IT executives accounting for 25 per cent of spend. That now places it below ‘Next’ with 31 per cent and the Fin Review IT section with 30 per cent.

On the subject of MIS:

According to the McNairIT 2006 research, MIS is read by 52 per cent of senior IT decision makers, who are responsible for 71 per cent of the total Australian IT spend in companies of 50 people or more.

That was an improvement on its 2005 figures, in which it was read by 48 per cent of senior IT executives, accounting for 68 per cent of total spend.

CIO, meanwhile, is being read by the same number of IT decision makers as it was in 2005 at 48 per cent, but those readers this year accounted for only 62 per cent of the total spend, as opposed to 71 per cent last year.

No doubt there will be plenty more competitive gnashing of teeth. But regardless, team AFR is feeling quite chuffed, if not vindicated.