measurement

The television attribution provider and ad monitoring company is based in Paris. The companies said that TVTY will complement and expand Nielsen’s TV attribution and ad intel services.

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.”

Whip Media and the Entertainment Globalization Association are teaming up to create a new bi-monthly report called the Global Intelligence Tracker that will show how U.S. programs produced for streaming are performing in other countries.

Since the pandemic, many TV stations are facing measurement and under-delivery issues that they fear will only be compounded by Nielsen’s inclusion of BBO homes in October. While Nielsen is working to improve the sample, the uncertainty has some broadcasters turning to less Nielsen-reliant alternatives. Note: This story is available to TVNewsCheck Premium members only. If you would like to upgrade your free TVNewsCheck membership to Premium now, you can visit your Member Home Page, available when you log in at the very top right corner of the site or in the Stay Connected Box that appears in the right column of virtually every page on the site. If you don’t see Member Home, you will need to click Log In or Subscribe.

A new monthly Nielsen measurement called The Gauge shows just how much the pandemic has catalyzed streaming among a broad ranger of consumers with May usage across all television homes climbing to 26% of time spent on TV — outpacing broadcast, with an audience share of 25%. The streaming video data included SVOD and AVOD. Streaming and broadcast now account for half of television time. Cable accounted for 39%, and “other” viewing for 9%.

The company known for measuring television ratings said Netflix and YouTube are far ahead of their digital rivals, but viewers still spend more time watching cable and network TV.

The Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement (CIMM), a division of the Advertising Research Foundation, this morning said it is launching new research to “better understand how time is spent across every platform available on TVs today.” The initiative, dubbed the “Passive TV Measurement Study,” will explicitly look at how American consumers spend time with linear TV as well as OTT (over-the-top internet-connected) devices, smart TV apps and video game consoles.

Comscore, taking another swipe at ratings rival Nielsen, said its local-market data shows that during the pandemic, TV usage climbed starting last March, then decreased, but still finished the year higher than in 2019. Nielsen has been under fire for under-counting viewing with its panel-based data showing that TV usage was lower during the pandemic.

The provision of holistic linear and OTT measurements will provide thousands of advertisers with incremental reach and performance information on Tegna’s 64 TV stations and Premion streaming service.

The shift toward streaming deals and new competitors present a very real threat to its 70-year lead as the currency for TV buying.

Comscore posted a loss in the first quarter, but reported a small increase in revenue. The report follows Comscore resetting its finances with a $204 million investment from Charter, Qurate Retail and Cerberus. The first quarter net loss was $36.4 million, or 49 cents a share, compared to a $13.2 million loss, or $19 cents a share, a year ago. The 2021 loss includes a $15.3 million non-chase charge related to the recapitalization.

The new contract extends ViacomCBS’s portfolio rights for linear television currency.

An advanced advertising veteran, Kelly Abcarian joins NBCUniversal from Nielsen to accelerate the company’s investment and development in cross-platform measurement and data capabilities.

Nielsen said Friday it will not submit to an audit of its COVID-era ratings measurements, rejecting a request from TV networks who believe their ratings have been undercounted during the pandemic.

The Video Advertising Bureau accuses Nielsen of a “systematic undercounting” of TV program viewership since last March. Nielsen needs to respond to the accusation with more than a white paper.

The media industry’s go-to authority for measuring audiences acknowledged on Friday that the recent coronavirus pandemic bent its yardstick, but maintained nothing is broken. Nielsen, under fire from the TV networks that depend on it to count the audiences for which advertisers pay, says pandemic conditions resulted in a smaller panel of consumers it relies on to monitor TV viewing, but believes the trends it chronicles during 2020 remain viable.

The Video Advertising Bureau claims “systematic under-counting” as Nielsen lost 20% of its panelists it uses to measure TV usage during the pandemic.

The drop to $90 million came primarily from lower syndicated digital and movie revenue offset by increases in custom marketing solutions and Activation.

Citing “a renewed focus on measurement” in the wake of Google’s decision to abandon “identifier” tracking and ad targeting, a major equities research firm has upgraded Nielsen shares from a “market perform” to “outperform” — a Wall Street rating it hasn’t had in more than two years.

Nielsen on Tuesday announced the launch of a new service measuring viewing to theatrical films released direct-to-consumers via streaming services. Speaking during a session at the CES conference, Nielsen executives said the new theatrical video-on-demand audience measurement service was launched in response to pandemic’s impact on studios accelerating direct-to-consumer streaming of new films, often launched in conjunction with or in lieu of cinema releases.

Comscore, whose weak financial position has hampered its ability to compete as a provider of media measurement, has wiped out its debt with a $204 million strategic investment from Charter Communications, Qurate Retail and Cerberus. In addition to cleaning up its balance sheet, the deal gives Comscore access to data that will help it provide the new types of audience and impression based measurement that are being demanded by a changing media and advertising industry.

The ambitious “single currency” audience measurement plan unveiled by Nielsen this week comes with a price tag. And it will be paid mainly by charging higher prices to existing advertiser, agency and media customers, according to Wall Street analysts briefed by the company.

Nielsen is telling clients it is going to start measuring how many people watch TV commercials in a new way, a move that will mean big changes in the way $70 billion in national TV advertising is bought and sold.