Leveraging its role as an ad “currency” provider, Nielsen this morning unveiled a new service that it claims will make digital video directly comparable to TV ratings.
The new service, dubbed Qualified Ad Audiences, combines Nielsen’s existing Digital Ad Ratings with a new proprietary “viewability” verification method, as well as Nielsen’s invalid traffic filters, to provide a single, unduplicated view of persons-level audience delivery.
Nielsen said it is rolling the service out with two big digital video technology enablers: Comcast’s FreeWheel ad-trafficking system and independent Innovid.
By removing concerns about viewability and fraudulent traffic and combining it with industry standard audience estimates, Nielsen said the new service will enable advertisers and agencies to compare digital video campaign delivery directly with TV's.
I hope that this system allows users to create their own definition of digital ad "viewability"---like 100%---to make digital media "audience" estimates at least partially comparable to "linear TV.