• by Paul Gough , March 25, 2003

CMR/TNS Media Intelligence has signed a deal with FIND/SVP that gives FIND/SVP's customers access to most of the CMR advertising expenditure reports.

CMR's Stradegy2 database tracks ad spending for more than 1.7 million brands and 15 types of media. FIND/SVP's clients will be able to purchase individual reports for 14 of those media. Bill Levine, FIND/SVP's director of business development, said Tuesday afternoon that the deal does not yet include the Internet though it could in the future.

Levine said CMR's database is usually only been available via an annual subscription. That's not always possible for small- to mid-size agencies and even some larger clients may not have access to all of CMR's offerings. Levine said FIND/SVP was honored to be chosen by CMR to be able to offer its reports. "Mid- and small-size agencies can now buy it [CMR data] when they need it," he said.

FIND/SVP has about 2,000 clients, about a third Fortune 1000 companies and the rest small- to medium-sized business. The company's in-house consultants are now able to provide an even deeper base of knowledge than it had been able to previously, Levine said. For example, clients can find out what their competitors are doing in advertising expenditures through the CMR data. A senior media planner can find out what companies are advertising in a way to boost business development as well.

"It becomes for our marketing and advertising clients a really nice enhancement to the other kinds of services FIND provides ... CMR becomes this nice little ribbon on the package to help provide our clients with a competitive edge," he said.

Levine said that a lot of planners he talks to don't have complete access to CMR. "Now they can get this entire picture, as granular as they need it, to help them do their job," he said. Access to the CMR data won't be included in the annual relationship between FIND/SVP and its clients, Levine said. The reports could be purchased individually or through a debit account. The CMR data has been available for about two months.