• by Joe Mandese , December 5, 2007

In an effort to promote goodwill among its customers and to help promote high quality, but costly methodological research, Nielsen Co. has granted another $2.5 million to the Council for Research Excellence, an independent, client-controlled group that decides how to use the grant money for important research projects. The grant is the third bestowed by Nielsen in three years, bringing the council's budget to more than $7.5 million, at a time when many Nielsen clients don't have the resources to fund expensive methodological research on their own.

The commitment ensures a third year of operation and the continuation of at least two important projects begun over the past two years: the completion of a study on the differences between people who respond and those who do not respond to research surveys, as well as an ambitious study on how people use media being conducted by the Center for Media Design at Ball State University and Sequent Partners.

Although the $5 million Nielsen has granted to date has yielded little material or actionable research, Nielsen executives said it has laid the groundwork for important findings that will begin coming to light in early 2008, when the council releases its findings on the so-called "non-respondent" research, and plans are finalized for a full version of the Ball State study.

Beyond that, Nielsen said the funding has generated an even more important return for the Nielsen Co.: goodwill among its clients and the industry-at-large.

"I think customer satisfaction is really important. That's a really important form of ROI," Paul Donato, chief research officer of the Nielsen Co., told MediaDailyNews when asked what kind of return Nielsen has gotten for its investment in the council to date.

While he would not disclose how much of the money has actually been spent to date, he said the research that has been conducted were "really expensive projects that never would have been fielded in the industry if it wasn't funded this way."

Nielsen's corporate altruism also comes as the company has been taken private by a group of private equity firms, which have plans to ultimately flip the assets for a high return, and as Nielsen clients are bracing for humongous rate increases related to Nielsen's TV ratings sample expansion plan.

Donato said Nielsen also will realize internal benefits from the findings of all the council's research studies. The insights gleaned from the non-respondent survey, for example, will enable Nielsen to affirm or adjust its methods for dealing with the vexing problem of calculating the impact the omission of those people has on its research findings.

The results of the Ball State study will help Nielsen calibrate how people are actually using all media, including concurrent video platforms (TV, online, mobile, etc.), as it begins deploying its own multiplatform video measurement systems.

Donato deferred comment on the status and timing of a full blown Ball State study to the council's members, but he said it would be the "largest ethnographic" study ever conducted on how people use media.

As important as those studies are, Donato said there was also funding left over for some other important, but smaller research projects, including an objective analysis on the accuracy of media universe estimates, and other media usage projects.