Nielsen announces industry-wide move to impressions-based buying and selling
Nielsen has revealed plans to launch an Impressions-First Initiative in a bid to support an industry-wide move to impressions-based buying and selling in local markets.
The push towards an impressions-based currency will deliver a more complete, precise and representative audience measurement, along with the added benefit of enabling cross-platform audience measurement.
David Kenny, CEO of Nielsen stated in a release: “Nielsen is committed to measuring all audiences and the complete video consumption across the local marketplace. Impressions are the great equalizer across all screens, programs, listeners and viewers. Nielsen’s move to prioritize reporting impressions will help standardize the way it measures ads and content, enabling greater comparability across National, Local and Digital and is in line with Nielsen’s initiative to drive comparable metrics which are foundational to Nielsen ONE.”
Earlier in July, The Video Advertising Bureau (VAB) formally requested that Nielsen’s Media Ratings Council accreditation for their national TV service be revoked due to multiple, major and persistent violations. Nielsen, the market research firm whose methodologies are often viewed as the definitive standards for television and connected television (CTV) ratings and ad measurement, faced intense scrutiny as VAB claimed Nielsen’s sample was not consistent with pre-Covid standards and therefore was negatively effecting TV viewership.
The inclusion of BBO homes will enable the industry to rapidly transition to trading on impressions. Impressions represent all viewers regardless of platform—which is especially important given the significant and growing penetration of BBO homes in local markets. For more than two years, Nielsen has been working with the media and advertising industries in preparation for the inclusion of broadband-only homes in Local TV measurement for its 56 LPM and Set Meter markets.
In a statement, Perry Sook, Chairman and CEO, Nexstar Media Group, Inc said: “We believe the move to impressions and the integration of BBO homes into local measurement metrics is critical to making sure that every viewer is counted. It also enables buyers and sellers to make comparisons across all video across platforms, gives them the most complete view of audience consumption and behavior, and facilitates automated buying.”
Andrew Alford, President of Broadcasting for Nexstar Media Inc said: “Nexstar’s sales teams have been working toward the transition to selling impressions in coordination with a number of our largest clients, as it is the best way to make sure that no viewer goes uncounted. We expect to be transacting on impressions exclusively in early 2022, so Nielsen’s decision to implement an impressions-based measurement metric at the same time is a very welcome development.”
The industry-wide move from ratings to impressions will kick off in January 2022. The company will default its local reporting settings to impressions in its software systems (Arianna, NLTV, eVip) and will lead with impressions in all of its external communications. Ratings will remain available to end-users for planning purposes.
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