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Nielsen to Tally 'TV Everywhere' Ads
[April 11, 2011]

Nielsen to Tally 'TV Everywhere' Ads


(Multichannel News Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) NIELSEN’S FIRST EFFORT TO COMBINE Internet video watching with traditional TV ratings is set to go live this month but initial demand seems limited.

Starting the week of April 25, the company will count online vie ws of TV shows that carry the same national ads that appeared in the original broadcasts in its extended three-day ratings. Referred to as “C3,” the metric was designed to give credit for viewing on digital video recorders within three days of air. Ratings, including “Extended Screen,” will be available to Nielsen clients May 16.



Initially, however, Turner Broadcasting System appears to be the onlyprogrammer interested in serving the same ad load online, in certain episodes it makes available through TV Everywhere services with affiliates including Comcast, Dish Network and Verizon Communications’ FiOS TV.

The idea behind the metric is that C3 ratings for shows from such networks as TBS and TNT would get an extra bump from cable subscribers watching on their PCs. “We provide content that will be rated [by Nielsen’s Extended Screen service] from all of our networks,” Turner spokeswoman Misty Skedgell said. “The content changes on a weekly basis and we plan on providing more as we go into the future.” Representatives for NBC Universal and Viacom last weeksaid they were still evaluating their options with respect to participating in Extended Screen. And many other broadcasters and cable programmers said they had no plans to replicate the TV advertising load in online content. (Nielsen declined to identify which networks it is working with on the project.) As one ad-agency executive said: “Wrapping online viewing into C3 is a technical achievement, but isn’t terribly important from a business perspective since the ad loads online still don’t match TV.” Nielsen kicked off the initiative, originally dubbed “TVandPC,” in 2009. It began deploying software to participants in its 20,000-household National People Meter panel in February 2010. Currently, more than 9,000 of those homes are outfitted to measure Extended Screen viewing on computers, and Nielsen plans to continuously add more.


“It is the most highly representative single-source panel of its kind,” Matt O’Grady, Nielsen executive vice president of cross-platform audience measurement, said.

There’s a chicken-and-egg issue in getting TV content providers to participate in the new model, O’Grady pointed out: “The content will be there when it can be monetized effectively.” He added, “We’ll follow what the industry wants us to do.” Nielsen is already working on the second phase of Extended Screen, which will be able to track fewer commercial loads and other scenarios, O’Grady said. Details are still to be determined, but measuring TV viewing on iPads and other Internet-based devices will be an part of Nielsen’s Extended Screen “2.0,” he said.

Both Time Warner Cable and Ca-blevision Systems have launched iPad apps that provide live television and one of the concerns from programmers is that they get proper credit for ad impressions on these new devices (see Platforms, page 26).

“We’re working with the operators to make sure we have the appropriate measurement tool in place for every application,” O’Grady said. “This is not daunting to us because we have the infrastructure in place.… I think what has happened this time is, things are moving so quickly.” ¦ “It is the most highly representative single-source panel of its kind.” MATT O’GRADY, NIELSEN Counting Screens Details of Nielsen’s online-video ratings plan: ¦ Data collection begins week of April 25.

¦ Content must carry same national ads that ran in the broadcast version and be viewed within three days of air to receive C3 credit.

¦ National promos and local ads may be removed and/or un-encoded digital ads may be inserted over them in online versions.

SOURCE: Nielsen 2011 International Press Telecommunications Council

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