Nielsen says new video currency will be ready for use by 2024

Nielsen plans to do away with its current commercial ratings by 2024. The measurement behemoth announced a new currency on Tuesday that will measure each individual ad instead of an average of commercial minutes as it currently does. This new solution, dubbed Nielsen One, will provide second-by-second measurement and the reach and frequency of each individual ad across screens, marrying linear viewing with digital impressions. The product will be available broadly in the fourth quarter of 2022, with plans to replace the so-called C3 and C7 currency entirely in the fall of 2024. There’s a lot to unpack in the announcement and much will depend on industry adoption. Nielsen has received plenty of heat over the years for its slowness in adapting to the changes in consumer behavior and develop a new currency in which to transact that is more reflective of the fragmented way viewers consume content. This has led many TV companies to adopt their own measurement solutions. But these have not been uniform and still leave a lack of standardization and reliance on metrics that are becoming increasingly outdated. The goal of Nielsen’s new product is to help the industry better understand audiences, manage the number of times an ad is seen and eliminate double counting, inflated metrics and advertising waste. Nielsen will be able to identify each individual ad that runs on live TV and find it across devices like mobile and CTV. In this way, advertisers would be able to see how much of its audience came from live TV, YouTube, Hulu and the like. Nielsen has taken steps in recent months to evolve its ratings currency to begin to include addressable measurement and expanding its connected TV coverage to include YouTube and smart TV data from Vizio. Whether Nielsen’s latest solution will be welcomed by the industry will depend on what the data looks like and how it is able to be integrated into holding companies’ planning tools, among other things. New rules There will need to be a lot of work to determine the rules for making historical comparisons and define an impression, which “is a simple question with a complicated answer,” says Scott Brown, general manager, audience measurement, Nielsen. Certainly, there is an appetite from agencies to unify linear units and digital impressions with a common people-based measure that allows the industry to look at and understand audiences holistically, says Adam Gerber, global chief media officer, Essence. But it won’t ultimately be up to Nielsen to decide when the industry decides it will change currency, he adds. The new system will come with its own set of challenges, like figuring out year-over-year comparisons and looking back at historical deliveries or schedules. The next steps, Gerber says, is seeing the prototype data and the types of data sets Nielsen will provide. In the interim, he says the industry should start preparing for the implications, including how it will change workflow. There’s also the question of cost and whether the solution will be cost-efficient and create a value worth paying for, Gerber adds. More long-term, Gerber says he will look to see how Nielsen will incorporate shorter-form digital content from YouTube and social environments as well as video-like experiences on gaming platform.

Nielsen says new video currency will be ready for use by 2024

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