• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, December 5, 2024

Paramount Global’s latest big series “Landman,” from its “Yellowstone” hit producer Taylor Sheridan, scored a massive 14.6 million global viewers in its first week from all its media platforms, including Paramount Network and Paramount+.

Or did it?

The viewing numbers did not come from Nielsen, but rather from Paramount Global internal data, as well as the company’s existing deal with VideoAmp.

This comes in the midst of a Nielsen contract dispute that Paramount has with the measurement company over pricing of a new contract deal. Paramount says Nielsen is asking for a “substantial” price increase. Nielsen says Paramount wants a “nearly 50%” price cut.

Paramount has been using VideoAmp’s data since its contract with Nielsen expired at the end of September.

According to reports, the viewing number for "Landman" is the average minute audience for the show’s first seven days -- something Nielsen currently does for its viewing of TV shows. Nielsen’s viewing data comes via a panel of 40,000 TV households -- data which will increasingly being supplemented by other sources.

This has occurred while Paramount Global platforms have been releasing major TV shows -- new and old -- this fall.

For “Yellowstone,” its Season Five premiere night start scored 16.4 million U.S. viewers, while the second half start of its fifth season took in 21 million for live program-plus-three-day viewing measure.

The second season of “Lioness” took in 12.4 million viewers globally across all platforms.

Increasing the non-traditional "alternative" measure results for TV/streaming shows comes as no surprise in the growing world of transitioning viewing measures.

From a media buyer's side of thinking, agencies still have their own measure deals with Nielsen, which, no doubt, can be used -- if necessary -- to negotiate with Paramount for TV ad buys.

For its part, Nielsen’s “Big Data” continues to move ahead slowly in factoring in viewing of TV shows from other non-traditional platforms. ‘Big Data’ is melding linear TV viewing with data from set-top boxes (STBs), smart TVs, and its 40,000 home panel. Measures here also include return-path data (RPD) and automatic content recognition (ACR) data.

Typically TV program consumer marketing don’t customarily cite viewing data of TV shows to draw in viewers. But they might tout that a show is a “big hit” somewhere in its copy.

More importantly, it will show off a big producer’s name and his TV show pedigree. Currently, “Landman” does just that with Sheridan’s name and his original big hit “Yellowstone.”

Is there a need to spell out for consumers new differences in measuring the popularity of a TV show?

Truth in advertising issues: How much does it extend into entertainment?