In the fall of 2013, Nielsen officially acquired radio ratings giant Arbitron, merging it into the company and rebranding it as the newly-formed Nielsen Audio division. With the former Arbitron services now integrated into Nielsen, SVP of Local Media Product Leadership Farshad Family spoke with FMQB to discuss the state of the company. Family has risen through the ranks at Nielsen, and now leads product strategy for its local media business in the U.S., including local audio and TV audience measurement. In this week’s eQB Cover Story, Family talks about the integration of audio measurement into Nielsen’s existing services, as well as the measuring of listenership for digital audio and streaming services, along with the future of PPM and diary markets, and more.
Farshad Family
By Joey Odorisio
Last fall, Nielsen officially acquired longtime radio ratings giant Arbitron, merging it into the company and rebranding as Nielsen Audio. With the former Arbitron services now integrated into Nielsen, the company’s SVP of Local Media Product LeadershipFarshad Family spoke with FMQB to discuss what’s next. The veteran media executive has risen through the ranks at Nielsen, and now leads product strategy for Nielsen’s local media business in the U.S., including local audio and TV audience measurement. In this week’s eQB Cover Story, Family talks about the integration of audio measurement into Nielsen’s existing services, as well as the measuring of listenership for digital audio and streaming services, along with the future of PPM and diary markets, and more.
What was your history before joining Nielsen, and leading up to your role now within the company?
I currently lead product strategy for Nielsen’s local media business in the U.S., including radio and local television audience measurement. Previously within Nielsen, I was the Managing Director for Nielsen Media in India, where I managed Nielsen’s media businesses in television, online, and telecom throughout India.
Prior to that, I worked in Nielsen Media’s strategy and business development group in New York, where I oversaw initiatives related to corporate strategy, partnerships, and new ventures.
I joined Nielsen from McKinsey & Company, where I was a leader in McKinsey’s Media and Entertainment practice. In that role, I was responsible for serving clients in a variety of media and telecom sectors, particularly on issues of strategy, growth and innovation.
Now that most of the dust has settled from the Arbitron deal, what have been some of the notable benefits and changes at Nielsen from the acquisition?
Since the creation of Nielsen Audio last fall, we have been focusing on five key areas of improvement for our audio clients: researching audio advertising effectiveness, developing new sales solutions, working to introduce digital audio measurement, spotlighting audio’s strengths, and investing in sample improvements.
Of those, the most notable and the one you have probably read the most about is the advertising effectiveness work we have done. It has been an exciting area to explore because prior to the acquisition of Arbitron we did not have a way to measure radio’s ROI by merging the listener data with Nielsen’s extensive collection of consumer data across many categories. Now, we have the ability to create single-source insights which connects what people listen to with what they buy. The initial studies we conducted showed that radio delivers a positive ROI, which should encourage advertisers about the value of radio as part of the media mix. Radio ROI is an exciting area and we are looking forward to working with our clients to better understand that connection.
What have been some of the challenges?
One of the big reasons we wanted to be in the audio business is that it’s a really important medium to millions of Americans and trails only television in how we spend our time as consumers. Now that we can include radio, and more broadly audio, in putting together a comprehensive picture of what consumers are using, that opens up another set of really intriguing questions about how people are engaging with different mediums, and does it affect what they buy. Put another way, Nielsen is about connecting what we call the three “Rs” which are Reach, Resonance and Reaction. We have the reach (what consumers listen to) and now our challenge is to fill in details around the other two. How did audio influence the listeners, and ultimately what actions did they take as a result? Our work on the ROI insights was a good first step in this direction.
A major issue facing Nielsen is that technology tends to evolve and move faster than measurement systems can keep up with them. What are the current ways that Nielsen Audio is keeping pace with evolving trends in audio listening?
Our mandate is to measure audio consumption in a comprehensive manner. We know that there are many different types of audio consumers and a growing landscape of audio platforms, and as consumers embrace new platforms Nielsen needs to be there to capture their listening. Our goal is to measure audio wherever it travels, in various forms. By leveraging PPM measurement along with our own technology we developed to measure online campaign ratings and digital TV ratings, we are working towards a solution that can measure audiences at the point of consumption, as opposed to being on the server side and relying on server log files.
Where does Nielsen Audio stand currently in its measurement plans for Digital Audio? Can you give an update on its status? I know there was a slight overview given back in April at the NAB Show in Las Vegas.
Measuring digital audio is one of our top priorities as consumers expand audio consumption on smartphone, tablets and connected devices. Since the NAB earlier this year, we’ve been really encouraged by the level of client engagement, support and technical development on this front. We look forward to sharing more details about our progress soon.
How do streaming services such as Pandora, Spotify, etc. fit into this plan?
From day one, our goal has been to measure all audio content and platforms, especially where advertisers can reach their most important consumer audiences. We aim to measure curated streaming platforms like Pandora, Spotify and iTunes Radio, as well as other forms of audio consumption over time such as on-demand audio or podcast services.
The key is providing brands and marketers with the most insightful view of streaming audio consumers so they can make informed choices with were to place advertising.
How is Nielsen tying together its previous data and information collection services with the newly-acquired audio metrics side of things? Nielsen recently released a study on CBS’ radio and TV audience measurement.
Similar to the advertising effectiveness research I mentioned previously, this is another area of substantial opportunity to learn more about how consumers are using media in their daily lives. We think it is important to be able to measure media platforms both as stand-alone as well as in addition to other platforms: for example, radio plus local TV. Consumers interact with multiple platforms in a given day and the ability to provide a cohesive understanding of their consumption patterns across platforms is of growing importance for advertisers. We have just started to cover some ground in this area with the CBS study.
What is the latest on expansion and increased accuracy for the PPM?
We announced last fall that we would be making some significant investments in our audio measurement by adding a sample increase in PPM markets to the tune of around seven percent in aggregate across all markets. This increase was mostly targeted to smaller markets where the need was greatest, and in those markets the increases were closer to 20 percent. It was designed to add stability to the ratings. That wave of panel expansion is complete as of the June PPM data. We also have plans to introduce another wave of sample increases later in the year to target some of the hardest to reach demographics. We will be sharing more details with clients about our plans soon.
What does the future hold for diaries and diary-based markets?
We are committed to continuous improvements for our measurement methodologies, regardless of market type. With the Diary, we have been making some good progress over the past year with improving our samples, particularly among younger listeners. We have introduced some new sampling techniques that allow us to be more efficient in adjusting to the Diary returns as they come in. We have also improved our recruitment process for cell phone households, which make up around 30 percent on average of our samples in all markets. Lastly, we are moving forward with developing an electronic diary methodology, or E-Diary. We have done three full tests of the E-Diary so far and are conducting another one this year. We are pleased with the steady results we have seen from our tests and look forward to sharing more about our progress as we evolve this new service.
[eQB Content By Joey Odorisio]
