In a move likely to spark some ad industry controversy, the Advertising Research Foundation this morning issued a call to the industry to scrap the way it has defined the fundamental building block of television audience measurement — the so-called “TV household” — and replace it with a more encompassing one: the “TV-accessible household,” or TVA for short.
With attention becoming a more important metric to advertisers looking to ensure their messages are connecting with viewers, the Advertising Research Foundation said it has begun mapping attention measurement providers. The initiative is a part of the ARF’s Attention Validation initiative.
In a call-to-action, the Advertising Research Foundation says that “audience measurement is at a crossroads” and that “the future of ad-supported media” is at stake. The call — which is timed to lead into the ARF’s Audience X Science conference next week — offered little in the form of action, but included obligatory rhetoric asking “the advertising industry to embrace greater transparency and cooperation, as well as provide increased support for trials of interoperable solutions that can address the gaps in existing single-source approaches.”
In what appears to be an industry first, the Advertising Research Foundation is teaming with seven industry research and/or media suppliers to conduct research on digital device usage and account sharing, which it plans to ultimately launch as a syndicated measurement service. As part of the announcement, the ARF said it would apply to the Media Rating Council to accredit the service in its “second year of execution.”
Exclusives
Looking to find standard data formats for ad campaigns, the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement, along with Ad-ID, Advertising Research Foundation, IRI, and Kantar, will launch a joint initiative.
After years of being chaired by a digital media executive, the Advertising Research Foundation once again has named a traditional consumer marketer to head its board. Barbara Murrer, senior director of marketplace insights for quintessential American brand Levi Strauss & Co., is succeeding Google Director of Brand Measurement Jed Meyer as the foundation’s chair.
Bob Barocci, the Madison Avenue vet who has overseen the ad industry’s Advertising Research Foundation during one of the most tumultuous periods impacting media and marketing research, will retire Dec. 31, 2013, 10 years after he joined the organization following a career as a top ad man at legendary agency Leo Burnett.
