Nielsen ratings

Nielsen Ratings are audience measurement systems developed by Nielsen Media Research to determine the audience size and composition of television programming. Nielsen conducts these tests by calling the locals and asking them what they are watching at the moment. Nielsen operates in over 100 countries and was founded in 1923.

The system has been updated and modified extensively since it was developed in the early 1940s by Arthur Nielsen. It has since been the primary source of audience measurement information in the television industry around the world. Since television as a business makes money by selling audiences to advertisers, the Nielsen Television Ratings are the single most important element in determining advertising rates, schedules, and program content .

The company is part of the Nielsen Company, formerly known as VNU and owned by a consortium of private equity firms including Blackstone Group, KKR and Carlyle Group. Its production operations are located in its Brooker Creek Global Technology and Information Center in Oldsmar, Florida.

Measuring ratings

Nielsen Television Ratings are gathered by one of two ways; by extensive use of surveys, where viewers of various demographics are asked to keep a written record (called a diary) of the television programming they watch throughout the day and evening, or by the use of Set Meters, which are small devices connected to every television in selected homes. These devices gather the viewing habits of the home and transmit the information nightly to Nielsen through a "Home Unit" connected to a phone line. Set Meter information allows market researchers to study television viewing habits on a minute to minute basis, seeing the exact moment viewers change channels or turn off their TV. In addition to this technology, the implementation of individual viewer reporting devices (called people meters) allow the company to separate household viewing information into various demographic groups. In 2005, Nielsen began measuring the usage of digital video recordings (TiVo, for example) and initial results indicate that time-shifted viewing will have a significant impact on television ratings. The networks are not yet figuring these new results into their ad rates at the resistance of advertisers.

Ratings/share and total viewers

The most commonly cited Nielsen results are reported in two measurements: ratings points and share, usually reported as (ratings points/share). As of August 27, 2007, there are an estimated 112.8 million television households in the United States. A single national ratings point represents one percent of the total number, or 1,128,000 households for the 2006-07 season. Share is the percentage of television sets in use tuned to the program.

For example, Nielsen may report a show as receiving a 9.2/15 during its broadcast, meaning that on average 9.2 percent of households were tuned in at any given moment. Additionally, 15 percent of all televisions in use at the time were tuned into this program. Nielsen re-estimates the number of households each August for the upcoming television season.

Nielsen Media Research also provides statistics on estimated total number of individual viewers, and on specific demographics. Advertising rates are influenced not only by the total number of viewers, but also by particular demographics, such as age, sex, economic class, and area. Younger viewers are considered more attractive for many products, whereas in some cases older and wealthier audiences are desired, or female audiences are desired over males.

Because ratings are based on samples, it is possible for shows to get 0.0 share, despite having an audience; CNBC talk show McEnroe was one notable example. Another example is The CW show CW Now, which received two 0.0 ratings in the same season.

Commercial ratings

Nielsen provides viewership data calculated as the average viewership for only the commercial time within the program. This “Commercial Ratings” first became available on May 31, 2007. Additionally, Nielsen provides different “streams” of this data in order to take into consideration delayed viewing (DVR) data. Nielsen’s clients now have access to all the data they need to develop individualized minute-by-minute ratings of national commercials by demographic group for all national television programs, including DVR playback at any interval up to seven days.

"Sweeps"

Much of the ratings system, however, still consists of the completion by viewers of ratings diaries, in which a viewer records his or her viewing habits, generally for a week, in exchange for being advanced a nominal amount (up to $30 in the United States). These diaries play an especially important role during the four sweeps periods conducted in February, May, July and November in an attempt to measure smaller local market audiences in markets that are not covered by People Meter samples already. (Other, smaller sweeps are conducted through the year in the markets large enough to be measured by non-demographic meters, but not large enough to be measured by the demographic meters (people meters).

The term "sweeps" has two meanings. One refers to how the diaries were handled by Nielsen Media when the ratings were first produced: They are mailed to the households and processed by starting on the East Coast and "sweeping" across the nation. The other refers to television programming during the months of November, February, May and (of lesser importance) July, in which eagerly anticipated programs are deliberately scheduled in order to boost television ratings.

Television networks and other programmers make unusual efforts to attract additional viewers during these periods, including broadcasting mostly original programming as opposed to repeats, showing more special broadcasts, and including special content in programming such as guest stars, controversial and unexpected plots or topics, extended episodes, finales, and increased competition in advertising. Even news programs are often involved, broadcasting especially controversial or titillating investigative reports and promotions. For this reason, the "sweeps" system of national ratings has been criticized as not representative of typical programming, and encouraging an increase in content of concern such as violence and explicit sexuality. Outside of these peak periods it is more common to see reruns of television programs.

Nielsen 2008 Sweeps Dates:

February 2008	31 January - 27 February, 2008
May 2008	24 April - 21 May, 2008
July 2008	3 July - 30 July, 2008
November 2008	30 October - 26 November, 2008

Criticism of ratings systems

There is some public critique regarding accuracy and potential bias within Nielsen's rating system. In June of 2006, however, Nielsen announced a sweeping plan to revamp its entire methodology to include all types of media viewing in its sample.

Since viewers are aware of being part of the Nielsen sample, it can lead to bias in recording and viewing habits. This criticism is common to any and all survey research. Audience counts gathered by the self-reporting diary methodology are sometimes higher than those gathered by the electronic meters, which provide less opportunity for response bias. This trend seems to be more common for news programming and popular prime time programming. Also, daytime viewing and late night viewing tend to be under-reported by the diary.

Another criticism of the measuring system itself is that it fails the most important criteria of a sample: it is not random in the statistical sense of the word. Only a small fraction of the population is selected and only those that actually accept are used as the sample size. Compounding matters is the fact that of the sample data that is collected, advertisers will not pay for time shifted (recorded for replay at a different time) programs rendering the 'raw' numbers useless. In many local areas, the difference between a rating that keeps a show on the air and one that will cancel it is so small as to be statistically insignificant, and yet the show that just happens to get the higher rating will survive. Worse, as the possible choices increases so does the margin of error resulting in the sampling sizes being too small.

In 2004, News Corporation retained the services of public relations firm Glover Park to launch a campaign aimed at delaying Nielsen's plan to replace its aging household electronic data collection methodology in larger local markets with its newer and more accurate electronic People Meter system. The advocates in the public relations campaign charged that data derived from the newer People Meter system represented a bias toward underreporting minority viewing, which could lead to a de-facto discrimination in employment against minority actors and writers. Nielsen countered the campaign by revealing its sample composition counts. According to Nielsen Media Research's sample composition counts, as of November 2004, nationwide, African American Households using People Meters represented 6.7% of the Nielsen sample, compared to 6.0% in the general population. Latino Households represent 5.7% of the Nielsen sample, compared to 5.0% in the general population. This showed that ethnic minorities were actually overrepresented in the sample, contrary to what was charged in the News Corporation's public relations campaign.

Another criticism of the Nielsen ratings system is its lack of a system for measuring television audiences in environments outside the home, such as college dormitories, transport terminals, bars, and other public places where television is frequently viewed, often by large numbers of people in a common setting. In 2005, Nielsen has announced plans to incorporate viewing by away-from-home college students into its sample. Internet TV viewing is another rapidly growing market for which Nielsen Ratings fail to account for viewer impact. Apple iTunes, atomfilms, YouTube, and some of the networks' own websites (e.g., ABC.com, CBS.com) provide full-length web-based programming, either subscription-based or ad-supported.

Furthermore, a new problem has developed, especially with the February sweeps. For the 2001-2002 season, the National Football League moved Super Bowl XXXVI to February, when it was placed in the sweeps period, because of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, which postponed the NFL schedule a week. Because of that, starting with the 2003-04 season, the NFL moved the Super Bowl into the sweeps period.

Since the move of the Super Bowl into the sweeps period, Sunday nights in the sweeps period in February is almost guaranteed to be a winner for the network holding the big event on each of the four Sundays — the Super Bowl (alternates among NBC, CBS, FOX), Grammy Awards (moved to Sundays since 2003 except during Olympics, CBS), Daytona 500 (finish moved into prime-time in 2007; FOX), or Academy Awards (moved into the sweeps period in 2004, ABC), and every fourth year the Winter Olympics (next telecast 2010, NBC).

Annual top-rated shows

Nielsen began compiling ratings for television nationally beginning in 1950. Prior to that year, television ratings were compiled by a number of other sources, including C. E. Hooper and Variety. Today, Hooper is barely remembered; the company was bought out by Nielsen in February 1950.

These are the programs that finished with the highest average Nielsen rating in each television season:

Year	Program	Channel
1951	Texaco Star Theater	NBC
1952	Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts	CBS
1953	I Love Lucy	CBS
1954	I Love Lucy	CBS
1955	I Love Lucy	CBS
1956	The $64,000 Question	CBS
1957	I Love Lucy	CBS
1958	Gunsmoke	CBS
1959	Gunsmoke	CBS
1960	Gunsmoke	CBS
1961	Gunsmoke	CBS
1962	Wagon Train	NBC
1963	The Beverly Hillbillies	CBS
1964	The Beverly Hillbillies	CBS
1965	Bonanza	NBC
1966	Bonanza	NBC
1967	Bonanza	NBC
1968	The Andy Griffith Show	CBS
1969	Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In	NBC
1970	Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In	NBC
1971	Marcus Welby, M.D.	ABC
1972	All in the Family	CBS
1973	All in the Family	CBS
1974	All in the Family	CBS
1975	All in the Family	CBS
1976	All in the Family	CBS
1977	Happy Days	ABC
1978	Laverne & Shirley	ABC
1979	Three's Company	ABC
1980	60 Minutes	CBS
1981	Dallas	CBS
1982	Dallas	CBS
1983	60 Minutes	CBS
1984	Dallas	CBS
1985	Dynasty	ABC
1986	The Cosby Show	NBC
1987	The Cosby Show	NBC
1988	The Cosby Show	NBC
1989	The Cosby Show	NBC
1990	The Cosby Show & Roseanne	NBC & ABC
1991	Cheers	NBC
1992	60 Minutes	CBS
1993	60 Minutes	CBS
1994	Home Improvement	ABC
1995	Seinfeld	NBC
1996	ER	NBC
1997	ER	NBC
1998	Seinfeld	NBC
1999	ER	NBC
2000	Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?	ABC
2001	Survivor: The Australian Outback	CBS
2002	Friends	NBC
2003	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	CBS
2004	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	CBS
2005	American Idol	Fox
2006	American Idol	Fox
2007	American Idol	Fox

See also

• List of television stations in North America by media market
• List of most-watched television broadcasts
• BARB
• Appreciation Index

References

• Anthony Bianco and Ronald Grover. "How Nielsen Stood Up to Murdoch" BusinessWeek. September 20, 2004.

External links

• Nielsen Media Research website
  • Nielsen Media: FAQs - About the "Sweeps"
• Slate.com: How Does Sweeps Week Work? (February 16, 2004)
• Nielsen Global Technology and Information Center website
• Nielsen Media Research: Everyone Counts
• Information on Nielsen's Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement Initiative.