The radio industry has been eagerly and patiently waiting for a ratings system that can accurately measure over-the-air listening and online listening — data that needs to be easily presentable and understandable to advertisers. Nielsen has been testing its online audio ratings product for many months, and Thursday the company announced the service is ready to go. Radio stations will have their first taste of presentable data in May.
The Nielsen Digital Audio Ratings service has been collecting data on more than 2,500 station streams across the 48 PPM markets (Nielsen says diary markets will follow soon). The service will formalize a two-month pre-currency preview period with data from the February and March surveys, available in mid-March and mid-April, respectively. Beginning with the April 2016 survey data, released in mid-May, clients must license Nielsen Digital Audio Ratings to access data related to their own media properties and the data of other subscribers. The estimates will include both an average-quarter-hour and average-minute audience metric for digital streams.
To measure streams, Nielsen uses what’s called a proprietary software development kit (SDK), which is integrated into mobile apps and Web players. This method uses big data, a census-style measurement approach, and demographic information from third-party data providers, which is calibrated with Nielsen’s PPM panel.
Nielsen Audio Managing Director Brad Kelly said, “With the way people consume content in a continual state of change, it’s critical to capture all of the platforms where people are listening to audio, whether on the radio, computers, or smartphones. To achieve Total Audience for audio, we must provide a comprehensive view of listening behavior across all platforms, and what better way to start than with radio. Nielsen Digital Audio Ratings allows broadcasters, advertisers, and marketers to better understand the dynamics of a station’s over-the-air and online audiences.”
