Nielsen gets access to AT&T STB viewing data for ratings measurement

Nielsen And AT&T Agree On Multi-Year Deal To Use Set-Top-Box Viewing Data For Ratings Measurement

NEW YORK — Today, Nielsen announced a multi-year agreement with AT&T to include anonymized set-top box data from connected homes subscribed to AT&T’s DIRECTV and U-Verse services into Nielsen’s local and national TV currency ratings services. Further enhancing the Nielsen Total Audience strategy, the data from the AT&T set-top boxes, integrated with Nielsen’s gold standard panels, will offer high-quality measurement that leads to a greater understanding of audiences and their viewing trends.

In 2017, Nielsen will combine panel data with anonymous TV viewing data from connected homes subscribed to AT&T’s DIRECTV and U-Verse services, which Nielsen will then use for reporting on an aggregated basis. AT&T’s data will enrich Nielsen’s local and national TV measurement services, providing enriched, electronic measurement in all 210 local TV markets. Data from AT&T’s DIRECTV and U-Verse set-top boxes will also be incorporated with data from other data providers to complement Nielsen’s national and local suite of products, such as Nielsen Scarborough, NLTV and Nielsen N-Score.

“Combining Nielsen’s high-quality panels with anonymized set-top box data from AT&T’s DIRECTV and U-Verse homes is at the center of our TV measurement strategy to enhance how TV viewing is measured. Nielsen is leveraging big data and its panel data to deliver comprehensive, reliable and in-depth measurement of how people consume content in today’s changing media landscape,” said Megan Clarken, President of Nielsen Product Leadership. “We continue to innovate and leverage all types of data in order to enhance our local and eventually national audience measurement solutions. The inclusion of data from various providers supplements Nielsen’s panel data by providing increased granularity and more robust insights broadening our total audience view.”

This announcement further reinforces the Nielsen Total Audience strategy and Nielsen’s commitment to providing media companies with a picture of their viewership. By working with providers such as AT&T to provide integrated big data, Nielsen continues to enhance and augment its measurement capabilities, further strengthening the currency measurement used by the industry to transact billions of advertising dollars.