Madison Avenue Weighs In On Commercial Ratings, Insists VCR Data Be Removed

Madison Avenue has officially weighed in on the debate surrounding Nielsen's new TV commercial ratings, adding a new, potentially combustible discussion point: the exclusion of VCR data. In a letter sent to late Thursday to Nielsen CEO Susan Whiting, the American Association of Advertising Agencies laid out the ad industry's position on Nielsen's plans to release average commercial minute ratings data beginning this fall. The letter, which was drafted with input from the AAAA's influential Media Policy, National Television and Radio, Local Television and Radio, Media Research and Media Technology committees, largely echoes points raised by other vocal groups such as the Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau, but adds the new VCR twist.

The letter is sure to stir the debate as Nielsen prepares to release the new TV ratings data, and as an ad hoc group of Nielsen clients are planning their own summit in hopes of establishing an industry consensus for how Nielsen should process and disseminate commercial ratings data.

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The AAAA's letter reiterates key points raised by the CAB, including the need to ensure that data used to identify commercial minutes is accurate, representative and audited and accredited by the industry's media ratings authority: the Media Rating Council. Nielsen's plan to date has been to utilize its Monitor-Plus system, which tracks TV commercials as part of its competitive ad spending reports, as the source for identifying commercial minutes for the new ratings. While deemed sufficient for competitive ad analyses, the Monitor-Plus data does not have the same level of rigor as ratings data used as the basis of advertising deals. It also does not measure all cable networks and commercial time and has not been accredited by the MRC.

"Any data released by Nielsen needs MRC accreditation," asserts the AAAA letter, which goes on to note that Nielsen needs to explain to the industry how the Monitor-Plus data can be brought up to speed to accurately identify all commercial minutes, and to distinguish between national and local cable minutes.

"If Monitor-Plus is to become the backbone of commercial audience estimates to be used as currency, the industry needs to be ensured of its validity. It will need MRC audit and accreditation for all national television activity (network, cable, syndication). What are Nielsen's plans in this regard?"

But the biggest development in the AAAA letter is its request that Nielsen "remove VCR recording from the equation," at least until Nielsen can find a way to accurately provide VCR playback data. When Nielsen originally began reporting VCR audiences in the 1980s, it claimed it did not have the ability to measure playback, and subsequently began crediting recording of TV shows as audience ratings, whether those shows were actually played back or not. That has been a major bone of contention among advertisers and agencies that believe that method grossly inflates the actual audience exposure of videotaped programming. Agency analyses of Nielsen data have shows that as much as a third of some program's audiences come from VCR recording.

"VCR recording should be removed from the ratings for any calculation of an average commercial minute," asserts the AAAA. "The network argument that since Nielsen can't measure VCR playback, it is equally unfair to remove recording from the ratings as leaving it in, is understandable when it comes to program-based ratings. When we're talking about commercial measurement, however, this argument no longer holds up. The move toward commercial type measurement provides the opportunity to correct this situation. We believe Nielsen has an obligation to provide the best research possible, and do not find it helpful for any average commercial minute tape to be released containing VCR recording, unless playback can be accurately measured by you."

The letter also addresses the statistical reliability of deriving audience ratings data from commercial minutes, which may average only 11 out of each 60-minute programming hour, vs. averaging them over the entire 60 minutes, and admonishes Nielsen for not taking a stronger role as an arbiter of its own data and how it should be used as market currency. To date, Nielsen has said it would make the new commercial minutes data available to clients on any basis they request, including versions that might include "live" only viewing, or those including various amounts of DVR and video-on-demand playback.

Agencies fought hard to have "live" only data become the currency of ad negotiations and guarantees during the 2006-07 upfront advertising market, and the subtext of the letter seems to suggest that they may dig in their heals to preserve that going forward into the new commercial minute ratings, even though networks would like to see some playback data included in them.

"We believe Nielsen has a responsibility to the industry beyond simply being a data provider," the AAAA committees admonished Nielsen. "When offering data as a syndicated industry product, the level of scrutiny must rise beyond what is necessary for an individual client's request. When Nielsen offers a syndicated product to the industry as a whole, Nielsen is implicitly (and explicitly) standing behind the data and vouching for its validity from a research standpoint. This is the main reason Nielsen delayed the release of its weighted national sample until convinced that it met its research standards and rose to the level of currency."

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