NEW YORK—Nielsen is working on the Nielsen ONE, a new single, cross-media system that is meant to drive more comparable and comprehensive metrics across platforms, the company has announced. Nielsen ONE is eyeing a Q4 2022 launch, with the intention to fully transition the industry to cross-media metrics by the fall 2024 season.
Viewers are watching video content across multiple different platforms, Nielsen has found. Between March and August 2020, Nielsen reports that U.S. adults spent 12.2 trillion minutes watching content on digital, 11.1 trillion minutes with linear and 2.8 trillion minutes streaming. As a result, advertisers and publishers are seeking a single view of audiences across all platforms and mediums.
Nielsen ONE will use a single metric across linear and digital to transact that will be the standard across the industry, Nielsen says. A single, deduplicated number will provide visibility into total video consumption regardless of platform device for marketers, as well as offering a better understanding of unique audiences; frequency and reduced double counting; inflated metrics; and advertising waste, per Nielsen.
“With Nielsen ONE we are delivering a single, comparable metric for TV and digital that will provide video consumption across all platforms, services and devices,” said Karthik Rao, COO, Nielsen. “For media buyers and sellers, this means better monetizing their assets and maximizing their investments.”
Nielsen has begun unifying its technology platform as part of its transition to Nielsen ONE. This includes:
- ONE Platform: A unified, cloud-based platform that allows integration and normalization of big data sets, including automatic content recognition (ACR) data and return path data (RPD), as well as direct integrations with digital platforms and connected TV (CTV) providers. It will also be underpinned by a flexible technology stack that enables large scale models using machine learning techniques to deliver comparability and consistency across sources.
- ONE Panel: Nielsen panels and meters will combine into a single-source, geographically representative panel that gathers viewing across devices including TV, CTV, mobile devices and computers. The Nielsen ONE panel uses it ID resolution system to validate audiences and deduplicate exposures across ads and content.
- ONE Product: A single cross-media product that provides reach and frequency metrics by delivering a holistic, deduplicated view of both content and ad performance regardless of screen, device or platform. ONE Product features technology that measures every single ad on linear TV at the subminute level to account for exact commercial minutes.
Nielsen had previously announced it was future-proofing its digital measurement, evolving its national TV currency to include addressable measurement and expanding CTV coverage to include additional smart TV manufacturers and digital video platforms in 2021.
Starting in Q4 2022, Nielsen will release parallel cross-media ratings that will deliver metrics at subminute levels for individual ads and content. Nielsen expects this measurement to become the foundation of cross-media buying and selling process across the entire industry by the fall 2024 season.
“With the rapidly evolving landscape and on-going shifts in consumer behavior, it is no longer acceptable to take a siloed approach to our clients’ video plans,” said Doug Ray, CEO, Dentsu Media. “Cross-media measurement is paramount to maximize reach across platforms with the right frequency. We are encouraged by Nielsen’s commitment to single measurement solution and unified framework that will drive comparability across TV and digital video so that our clients can better allocate dollars and maximize ROI.”
For more information, visit Nielsen’s website.
