Leading Australian digital audience measurement company Effective Measure and market research company Real Opinions, hosted a forum with some of the region’s leading online websites and Internet advertising exponents, including Emirates Airline, to commence the roll out of the Middle East’s first online audience measurement tool.

Real Opinions, a leading research agency based in Dubai, expects a number of leading websites to commence trials of the Effective Measure solution this month, with the Advertising and Media industry eagerly awaiting the results of which is hoped to boost confidence in the industry and to attract a larger share of advertising budgets.

Over 30 invitees attended the event representing over 100 websites, with Steve Wheeler, SVP of Emirates Group Corporate Communications, delivering the keynote speech.

"Emirates Group welcomes the initiative by Real Opinions to introduce the Effective Measure website visitor profiling tool in the Middle East. Any technology that provides more accurate estimates of visitor traffic and advances digital media in Emirates' home market should be embraced by media owners and agencies alike.” said Steve.

Dan Healy, CEO of Real Opinions added that “The Effective Measure solution promises "unprecedented accuracy in Web site visitor measurement, profiling and better understanding of the user experience. This will benefit not only those advertising online, but for websites themselves by understanding who is visiting and their feedback to help them build a better user experience and in turn loyalty – helping the whole industry."

Healy added, "Working with Effective Measure, we have addressed the impact of website visitors deleting their cookies, using our recently approved global patent pending "Digital Helix" technology to reduce the overestimation of unique visitors. This allows a more accurate calculation of Internet advertising frequency and reach – maximizing the impact of online advertising expenditure”.

Websites are invited to trial the Effective Measure solution for two months at no cost from the beginning of March 2009. Websites participating will instantly be included in the consideration set of media planners identifying their target groups on websites to advertise on.

Media planner Dimitri Metaxas, Group Director, OMD Digital added, “We in OMD are in support of solutions such as Real Opinion’s partnership with Effective Measure to create better transparency and sophistication in the market. The timing couldn’t be better as we truly believe that accountability and accuracy will be two of the biggest drivers in advertising over the next couple years. Measurement tools like this will be critical to us realizing these goals.”

To register your website for the 2 month trial, visit:

http://register.effectivemeasure.com