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Headline, Industry News
Few surprises as Nielson rates ads
Thursday October 18th 2007Sometimes a radical change to the formula still delivers the same result. That’s what happened Tuesday when Nielsen Media Research released highly anticipated commercial ratings for the first week of the fall prime-time TV season.
The ratings used a new metric called "C3," which measures how many viewers watch commercials during the live telecasts plus on digital video recorders in the following three days.
For the week of Sept. 24, the top three shows - <em>CSI</em>, <em>Dancing With the Stars</em> and <em>Grey’s Anatomy</em> – had roughly the same number of viewers in the C3 ratings as in the traditional measurement of live broadcast viewers.
"This is kind of like business as usual," said Brad Adgate, senior vice president of research at ad-buying firm Horizon Media. "There’s not too much in the way of variation, at least for the first week."
"We’re going to need a few days to digest the numbers, but it doesn’t look like there are any real surprises," said Shari Anne Brill, senior vice president at media services firm Carat.
Nielsen estimates 20 percent of the nation’s 113 million households have DVRs. The C3 ratings are the new basis for the rates advertisers pay networks to run commercials. They replace traditional ratings, which measure the average number of viewers watching over the duration of a show’s initial broadcast.
The C3 ratings cannot be directly compared with the old ratings, however. C3 measures average viewership during the specific times when commercials are aired; the old ratings measure average viewership during the entire show, including commercials.
It remains to be seen whether advertisers will be satisfied that enough people are actually watching commercials instead of avoiding them.
Media buyers and the networks receive much more detailed data than Nielsen releases to the public. Nielsen, for example, did not issue ratings by demographic, which are what industry insiders watch most closely.
"The numbers are exactly what we thought," said Alan Wurtzel, president of research at NBC Universal. He said the data for some shows, such as <em>The Office,</em> – which he said had higher C3 ratings than traditional ratings – "confirm our concern that we need to get credit for time-shifted viewing." Other NBC shows, like <em>Law and Order: SVU</em>, had lower C3 ratings.
The new system is a compromise between advertisers and broadcasters after years of squabbling over the best way to measure how many people watch commercials.
Last year, Nielsen began measuring DVR viewership over the seven days following the original prime-time telecast. The networks argued that those numbers – which added as many as 2 million viewers for some shows – should be used as the basis for ad rates. But the advertisers countered that many DVR users fast-forward through the ads, so they would be paying for nothing.
It turned out that nearly half of DVR users actually watch commercials, according to data Nielsen released in May. The two sides settled on the three-day period because Nielsen says 95 percent of all DVR viewing for prime-time shows is done within that period.
Brill said the new ratings are only a "baby step" in the direction of measuring actual commercial viewership. That’s because C3 rates the average viewers during all commercial minutes of a program, not for specific commercials. She wants Nielsen to deliver by-the-second ratings.
"Then," she said, "we’ll know exactly what we’re paying for."
<font size=1>Source: AP</font>
Headline, Industry News
Few surprises as Nielson rates ads
Thursday October 18th 2007Sometimes a radical change to the formula still delivers the same result. That’s what happened Tuesday when Nielsen Media Research released highly anticipated commercial ratings for the first week of the fall prime-time TV season.
The ratings used a new metric called "C3," which measures how many viewers watch commercials during the live telecasts plus on digital video recorders in the following three days.
For the week of Sept. 24, the top three shows - <em>CSI</em>, <em>Dancing With the Stars</em> and <em>Grey’s Anatomy</em> – had roughly the same number of viewers in the C3 ratings as in the traditional measurement of live broadcast viewers.
"This is kind of like business as usual," said Brad Adgate, senior vice president of research at ad-buying firm Horizon Media. "There’s not too much in the way of variation, at least for the first week."
"We’re going to need a few days to digest the numbers, but it doesn’t look like there are any real surprises," said Shari Anne Brill, senior vice president at media services firm Carat.
Nielsen estimates 20 percent of the nation’s 113 million households have DVRs. The C3 ratings are the new basis for the rates advertisers pay networks to run commercials. They replace traditional ratings, which measure the average number of viewers watching over the duration of a show’s initial broadcast.
The C3 ratings cannot be directly compared with the old ratings, however. C3 measures average viewership during the specific times when commercials are aired; the old ratings measure average viewership during the entire show, including commercials.
It remains to be seen whether advertisers will be satisfied that enough people are actually watching commercials instead of avoiding them.
Media buyers and the networks receive much more detailed data than Nielsen releases to the public. Nielsen, for example, did not issue ratings by demographic, which are what industry insiders watch most closely.
"The numbers are exactly what we thought," said Alan Wurtzel, president of research at NBC Universal. He said the data for some shows, such as <em>The Office,</em> – which he said had higher C3 ratings than traditional ratings – "confirm our concern that we need to get credit for time-shifted viewing." Other NBC shows, like <em>Law and Order: SVU</em>, had lower C3 ratings.
The new system is a compromise between advertisers and broadcasters after years of squabbling over the best way to measure how many people watch commercials.
Last year, Nielsen began measuring DVR viewership over the seven days following the original prime-time telecast. The networks argued that those numbers – which added as many as 2 million viewers for some shows – should be used as the basis for ad rates. But the advertisers countered that many DVR users fast-forward through the ads, so they would be paying for nothing.
It turned out that nearly half of DVR users actually watch commercials, according to data Nielsen released in May. The two sides settled on the three-day period because Nielsen says 95 percent of all DVR viewing for prime-time shows is done within that period.
Brill said the new ratings are only a "baby step" in the direction of measuring actual commercial viewership. That’s because C3 rates the average viewers during all commercial minutes of a program, not for specific commercials. She wants Nielsen to deliver by-the-second ratings.
"Then," she said, "we’ll know exactly what we’re paying for."
<font size=1>Source: AP</font>
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Headline, Industry News
Few surprises as Nielson rates ads
Thursday October 18th 2007Sometimes a radical change to the formula still delivers the same result. That’s what happened Tuesday when Nielsen Media Research released highly anticipated commercial ratings for the first week of the fall prime-time TV season.
The ratings used a new metric called "C3," which measures how many viewers watch commercials during the live telecasts plus on digital video recorders in the following three days.
For the week of Sept. 24, the top three shows - <em>CSI</em>, <em>Dancing With the Stars</em> and <em>Grey’s Anatomy</em> – had roughly the same number of viewers in the C3 ratings as in the traditional measurement of live broadcast viewers.
"This is kind of like business as usual," said Brad Adgate, senior vice president of research at ad-buying firm Horizon Media. "There’s not too much in the way of variation, at least for the first week."
"We’re going to need a few days to digest the numbers, but it doesn’t look like there are any real surprises," said Shari Anne Brill, senior vice president at media services firm Carat.
Nielsen estimates 20 percent of the nation’s 113 million households have DVRs. The C3 ratings are the new basis for the rates advertisers pay networks to run commercials. They replace traditional ratings, which measure the average number of viewers watching over the duration of a show’s initial broadcast.
The C3 ratings cannot be directly compared with the old ratings, however. C3 measures average viewership during the specific times when commercials are aired; the old ratings measure average viewership during the entire show, including commercials.
It remains to be seen whether advertisers will be satisfied that enough people are actually watching commercials instead of avoiding them.
Media buyers and the networks receive much more detailed data than Nielsen releases to the public. Nielsen, for example, did not issue ratings by demographic, which are what industry insiders watch most closely.
"The numbers are exactly what we thought," said Alan Wurtzel, president of research at NBC Universal. He said the data for some shows, such as <em>The Office,</em> – which he said had higher C3 ratings than traditional ratings – "confirm our concern that we need to get credit for time-shifted viewing." Other NBC shows, like <em>Law and Order: SVU</em>, had lower C3 ratings.
The new system is a compromise between advertisers and broadcasters after years of squabbling over the best way to measure how many people watch commercials.
Last year, Nielsen began measuring DVR viewership over the seven days following the original prime-time telecast. The networks argued that those numbers – which added as many as 2 million viewers for some shows – should be used as the basis for ad rates. But the advertisers countered that many DVR users fast-forward through the ads, so they would be paying for nothing.
It turned out that nearly half of DVR users actually watch commercials, according to data Nielsen released in May. The two sides settled on the three-day period because Nielsen says 95 percent of all DVR viewing for prime-time shows is done within that period.
Brill said the new ratings are only a "baby step" in the direction of measuring actual commercial viewership. That’s because C3 rates the average viewers during all commercial minutes of a program, not for specific commercials. She wants Nielsen to deliver by-the-second ratings.
"Then," she said, "we’ll know exactly what we’re paying for."
<font size=1>Source: AP</font>
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