Audience research
Part of Audience research for a parenting publication that studies the adult reader, not the child
Auditing rival parenting publications without profiling children or copying their work
Audit parenting publications in England through reader tasks, source quality, ad labels and public journeys without profiling children or copying work.
Competitor research should explain how other publishers serve an adult family decision, not assemble dossiers on creators or their children. Use public editorial and commercial material, save only what the comparison needs and date every observation. A visible post is not permission to copy it or harvest the people shown in it.
What to take away
- Compare rival parenting publications by the adult reader task, not by profiling creators or their children.
- Publicly accessible personal information remains subject to data protection law, so avoid scraping followers, comments or children's faces.
- Record whether each page concerns England, another UK nation, the whole UK or a global platform.
- Label any comparison a sample, not a league table, and date every observation.
- Turn gaps into an original brief that identifies a better-supported reader outcome.
Set the comparison boundary
Set the comparison boundary
Same reader task?
compare on that task
exclude from sample
- Define the reader task.Compare work answering the same problem, such as choosing childcare or setting up a first phone. A broad list of popular parenting accounts mixes different audiences and produces no useful editorial decision.
- State the geography.Record whether each page concerns England, another UK nation, the whole UK or a global platform. Do not score a creator down for omitting England rules if their work clearly serves a different place.
- Publish the inclusion rule.A defensible sample might include the first five active, adult-directed publications found through three stated queries on one date. Exclude private groups and accounts discovered through a child's profile. Label the result a sample, not a league table.
Inspect what an adult reader receives
Inspect what adult readers receive
- Map promise, evidence, action, commercial step
- Capture facts with URL and access date
- Check health, education, safety claims to primary records
- Observe headings, captions, transcripts, contrast, keyboard access
- Label independent, gifted, affiliate, sponsored or own product
- Map the journey.Note the promise in the title, evidence supplied, action offered and next commercial step. Capture facts in your own words with the URL and access date. Do not download family photographs or preserve comments containing names.
- Check source boundaries.Mark whether health, education, safety or entitlement claims lead to an appropriate primary record. A personal story can illustrate an experience but cannot establish a rule for every household.
- Review accessibility by observation.Check headings, captions, transcripts, contrast and keyboard access on public pages, while making clear that this is a limited desk check rather than a formal audit. Do not infer a disabled person's experience from the interface alone.
- Separate editorial from selling.Record whether an item is independent, gifted, affiliate-funded, sponsored or promoting the publisher's own product. The ASA's August 2026 social-media advertising advice says ads should normally carry a prominent, upfront label and warns that labels must work across devices and formats.
Treat public data with restraint
Treat public data with restraint
- Do not scrape followers, comments or children's faces
- Record platform counters only as dated observation
- Verify legal identity via Companies House
- Do not score incorporation, followers or posting frequency
- Record review method and incentive handling
- Avoid audience profiling.Do not scrape followers, comments, children's faces, school clues or account handles into a spreadsheet. The ICO and other regulators state that publicly accessible personal information remains subject to data protection law. Aggregate platform counters can be recorded as a dated observation, but they are not evidence of trust or English reach.
- Verify businesses at the source.Where legal identity affects a commercial assessment, use the Companies House search service and note that the register does not verify the accuracy of all filed information. Do not treat incorporation, follower count or posting frequency as a quality score.
- Check review practices.If a competitor publishes ratings, rankings or testimonials, record its method and handling of incentives. The CMA's current reviews and endorsements collection says reviews and online content must be genuine and accurate, and explains the banned practice concerning fake and concealed incentivised reviews.
Turn gaps into an original brief
- Choose one unmet decision.A gap is not simply a keyword another site has missed. It might be an official rule nobody explains clearly, a local variation hidden behind a national headline or an inaccessible format that adults asked for in separate research.
- Keep a provenance note.Save the query, inclusion rule, pages reviewed, dates, observations and the decision taken. Remove personal information that is not needed. Recheck before publication because disclosures, URLs and offers change.
Finish with an original content brief: the adult reader, problem, evidence standard, format and safeguard. Do not reproduce another publisher's wording, visual identity, private community knowledge or family story. The comparison has done its job when it identifies a better-supported reader outcome, not when it produces a verdict on another household.
Before you act
- Define the adult reader task before comparing publications.
- State the geography each page serves.
- Publish your inclusion rule and label the result a sample.
- Capture facts in your own words with URL and access date.
- Avoid scraping followers, comments or children's faces.
- Check review practices and label advertising clearly.
Common questions
What should a competitor comparison focus on instead of profiling creators or their children?
It should explain how other publishers serve an adult family decision. Use public editorial and commercial material, save only what the comparison needs and date every observation. A visible post is not permission to copy it or harvest the people shown in it.
How should you handle publicly accessible personal information when researching competitors?
Do not scrape followers, comments, children's faces, school clues or account handles into a spreadsheet. The ICO and other regulators state that publicly accessible personal information remains subject to data protection law. Aggregate platform counters can be recorded as a dated observation, but they are not evidence of trust or English reach.
What should you do with gaps found during a competitor comparison?
Choose one unmet decision. A gap is not simply a keyword another site has missed. It might be an official rule nobody explains clearly, a local variation hidden behind a national headline or an inaccessible format that adults asked for in separate research. Finish with an original content brief.
