Earlier this month, the Media Rating Council (MRC) approved the integration of first party live-streaming data into Nielsen’s already accredited National Television service and National Panel measurement. This announcement will have tremendous implications for the rest of the media measurement industry as Nielsen has become the first measurement service to have an MRC-accredited live streaming solution that also offers person-level granularity.
Isn’t it obvious Nielsen would be the standard?
Nielsen has long-been the leader in the media measurement industry, but there was a chance to cut into their market share when they lost MRC accreditation during COVID in 2021. At the time they lost their accreditation, their reputation was hurt and they (like all measurement companies at the time) didn’t have a reliable way to measure streaming services. The loss of MRC accreditation to their proprietary panel of 40,000+ people eliminated Nielsen’s one advantage on the rest of the market.
Other companies like VideoAmp and iSpot.TV started pushing their cross-measurement solutions to counter the gaps Nielsen measurement had. By the time Nielsen regained accreditation in April 2023, other media measurement companies hadn’t made enough progress to get advertisers/networks to fully pivot from Nielsen and failed to get MRC-certification for any of their streaming measurement solutions. Advertisers and networks were using non-Nielsen solutions because there was no accredited option in the market for streaming measurement.
What are the implications for the marketplace?
Now that Nielsen, who was already the industry leader, has this advantage over its competitors, where do the likes of VideoAmp and iSpot.tv go from here? They were positioning themselves as an essential part of a multi-currency system, but if Nielsen can be a one-stop shop with MRC backing across the board, the inertia of sticking with the standard weakens the chances of a multi-currency system. We have seen in the past two Upfronts that there is enthusiasm for the idea, but reluctance in practice to move away from Nielsen across the industry.
The ongoing dispute between Nielsen and Paramount might give a hint at how networks will react to this news. Nielsen and Paramount have been in a dispute over their contract for the past two months, with Paramount pushing VideoAmp as a replacement for Nielsen. While that is one major media company that is competing with Nielsen, other companies are still transacting primarily on Nielsen, and this addition of streaming data gives less reason to move away from their standard.
Recently, Advertiser Perceptions surveyed 200 marketers and found that 64% stated that alternative currencies were either just as or less effective than Nielsen (source: Adage). The survey also showed that reluctance to adopt new currencies stemmed from a lack of clear competitive advantage and the extra costs that will come from adoption. Most networks are already cash-strapped, so if Nielsen can be a one-stop shop, cutting the costs of alternate currencies that don’t provide clear additive value might be on the top of cost-cutting lists.
MRC-accreditation will be necessary for Nielsen’s competition if they want to be seen as a viable alternative. Comscore is also a competitor to Nielsen, but they have long-been a standard in local TV measurement. VideoAmp and iSpot.TV need to establish a clear value like Comscore with local TV. iSpot.TV does have their proprietary ad catalog that is MRC accredited, but that might not be enough as Nielsen’s Big Data incorporation is allowing them to vastly improve their ad-tracking capabilities. These alternate currencies have backing from the JIC, but the JIC was only established in July 2023, and it’s clear that JIC-backing is not the same as MRC-accreditation (in fact one of the JIC requirements is that the company seek out an MRC audit).
Now that MRC-accredited streaming data will be rolled out to Nielsen clients, ad agencies will soon be placing more investments into media measurement with a more complete picture captured by its ratings. Nielsen has already released 1st-party streaming data as part of their deal with Amazon for “Thursday Night Football,” so Nielsen clients have exposure to streaming ratings. That is only a sliver of the streaming landscape though, and agencies will be working behind the scenes to understand the changes to come and how they will impact their business.
It remains to be seen how this news will shake up the industry, but one thing is clear: Nielsen is now the best-resourced media measurement company and already has the biggest market share. This will bring the debate about a multi-currency system to its breaking point as Nielsen’s competitors will further have to justify their value and networks/agencies will have to decide if the additional costs of non-Nielsen solutions are worth it.
Posted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership self-publishing platform.
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