JWT extends AnxietyIndex to the Web platform

JWT has recently launched AnxietyIndex.com, an interactive site to help brands understand and navigate today’s consumer anxiety. With daily content updates and major research and trend reports added frequently, the site is intended as a place to discover and discuss how brands and consumers are responding to and coping with the current global recession. And with contributions from around JWT’s global network – from Shanghai, Sao Paulo and Mumbai to New York, London and Cape Town – AnxietyIndex.com offers a truly geographically diverse perspective.

“At 145 years old, we have a proven track record of leading brands through pivotal times like this,” JWT Chairman and CEO Bob Jeffrey said, adding, “We understand that this recession is unlike any other, and it is more important than ever to provide tools like our AnxietyIndex to help brands succeed in this new world order.”

The site is an evolution of JWT’s six-year-old proprietary AnxietyIndex, launched in February 2003 during the run-up to the war in Iraq. It tracks the level and intensity of consumer anxiety and, importantly, the drivers of anxiety, including safety and security concerns – the threat of terrorism, potential and current military hostilities, crime, etc., – and economic worries, such as the cost of healthcare, the cost of living and job security. The AnxietyIndex is designed to uncover consumer insights that can help inform strategies for marketing during times of high or low anxiety. Since then, JWT has run 15 waves of the AnxietyIndex across multiple markets.

JWT Global Planning Director Guy Murphy said, “AnxietyIndex.com is a uniquely forward-thinking effort that goes well beyond, making a case for marketing in a recession or reviewing historical recession data. It provides real time data, answers to new questions and a point of view on the types of businesses and business practices that will emerge from these turbulent times.”

Reports available on AnxietyIndex.com include trendletters like “Rethinking Aspirations,” and quantitative analyses like “American Dream in the Balance” and “Weathering the Storm: The Financial Crisis.” Current research and analysis will be added regularly.