Comments on: C3 Ratings directly via Nielsen: maybe there is something to be made of the lift after all

By: DD

DD — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:17:07 +0000

Thanks for clearing that up Holly. I was under the mistaken impression that Live+SD accounted for commercial viewing also.

btw, its refreshing to read an article’s comments with no ‘why do you hate my show’ entries.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:59:06 +0000

rheffern, “A key stat to watch in this method of mixing DVR viewing with live is to monitor what programs are DVR’d and watched much later or not at all, Those are your dying populars.”

We still get good numbers to be able to determine what shows are watched more after the airdate on DVR, here’s one look from last season.

As far as shows recorded but never watched, it’s conceivable that Nielsen tracks this, but I’ve never seen mention of it publicly.

By: rheffern

rheffern — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:54:44 +0000

A key stat to watch in this method of mixing DVR viewing with live is to monitor what programs are DVR’d and watched much later or not at all, Those are your dying populars.

By: Holly

Holly — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:00:41 +0000

@DD,

The Live+SD includes everyone who DVRed the show and watched it before 3 am the next morning. If those people fast forwarded through the commercials, they wouldn’t be counted in the C3 rating, which only count commercial viewing. The C3 also wouldn’t include anyone who watched the show live but flipped to another channel during the commercial breaks.

By: DD

DD — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 13:45:38 +0000

Could someone explain going from Live+SD(6.7) to C3(6.3)? How do you lose viewers?

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:25:07 +0000

Live+7 programming ratings are produced, but there is no C7 for commercial ratings. Advertisers have only agreed to pay based on 3 days out.

My guess is that the networks have paid Nielsen to look at the 7 day commercial ratings before, but that the numbers weren’t different enough from the C3 to merit renegotiating w/the advertisers and paying extra for for the measurements. But it’s only a guess.

By: Quinn

Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:13:27 +0000

This is fascinating data. It definitely seems to confirm that there is a significant uptick in dvr commercial viewing [c(LV) vs. c+3] but that Live+SD serves as a decent rough estimate for C3. There are some differences though, like NCIS:LA and Cougartown both having L+SD of 4.4 but NCIS:LA having a C3 4.2 vs C3 3.9 for Cougartown. Not a huge gap but significant. Does Nielsen generate a C7 or anything longer than C3? I think it would be really interesting seeing this data for shows like the Office or Fringe to see if shows with high percentage dvr viewers track differently in anyway.

By: Holly

Holly — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:13:20 +0000

Thanks guys

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:06:08 +0000

~~Julia, nope. I had SNF at a 6.8, but House at a 6.7. Maybe the overnights?~~

sorry, didn’t see “DVR charts” It was definitely 6.7 in the weekly L+SD stuff we get.

Holly, I’ve added the data into the table, for the broadcast primetime airings in the list.

By: Julia

Julia — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:04:26 +0000

I know Travis Yanan had it at 6.7 in the finals for Live+SD, so I assume you got that one right as well. Curious what could cause the discrepancy. Unless it’s a typo on the Nielsen level.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 04:01:51 +0000

Juila, ~~our first~~ both sources of DVR data for that week had the House L+SD rating as 6.8 in their spreadsheets.

I will admit not bothering to check those L+SD numbers with Nielsen’s Live+SD spreadsheet. There may be other differences.

My guess is that since that 6.8 was in both DVR viewing spreadsheets we received that it was in the Nielsen original DVR viewing spreadsheet, which we didn’t see.

By: Julia

Julia — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:58:39 +0000

The numbers Nielsen put out for Live+SD for House in the DVR charts is 6.8 for some reason. Or at least, that’s what you guys have listed.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:49:34 +0000

“Bill, if the television trade press was writing “DVR viewing has no revenue impact”, I’d agree with you. But they aren’t writing that, *you* are”

But, as of this week, we’ve effectively signed onto that definition too, just in the nick of time!

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:45:09 +0000

Bill, if the television trade press was writing “DVR viewing has no revenue impact”, I’d agree with you. But they aren’t writing that, *you* are .

And now, certainly, the trade press will write “DVR has revenue impact!”

DVR viewing does have revenue impact, but the difference between the L+SD and the L+7 viewing doesn’t. No harm in being less confusing.

I’ll update the table with the SD 18-49 data so it’s easy for people to do the comparisons.

By: Holly

Holly — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:33:46 +0000

Not to be greedy or get you in trouble, but is there any way you can include the Live+SD numbers for these shows?

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 03:33:07 +0000

In practice, the television press defines “DVR viewing” as “the increase from Live+Same Day ratings to Live+7 day ratings”.

By that definition*, “DVR viewing doesn’t matter to revenue” is correct, since the advertising value of the show is substantially captured by its Live+SD viewing.

*technically wrong as it may be because it doesn’t include Same Day DVR viewing, it seems to have become the accepted definition.

By: Robert Seidman

Robert Seidman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:47:58 +0000

Julia, you are correct, maybe I should have bolded “at least a little bit”.

With some things being precise and avoiding generalized blanket statements is worthwhile.

“Because the Live+SD numbers are a good proxy for C3, the additional DVR viewing we see for Live+7 doesn’t matter for a show’s prospects” is very different than: “DVR viewing doesn’t matter to revenue”.

By: Julia

Julia — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:40:28 +0000

we probably need to start rethinking the impact of DVR viewing, at least a little bit.

I don’t see why. The bottom line is still the same. C3 is approximately the same or less than Live+SD. Live+7 numbers are still pretty much meaningless in terms of renewal. We already knew that there is a faction of DVR viewers who do view commercials, and a lot of them are probably people who just rewind a show 30 seconds when they miss a line, and then are counted as DVR viewers.

By: Nightstar

Nightstar — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:38:57 +0000

Definitely some differences in there vs commercial ratings.

House up 1.1
Gray’s Anatomy up a point
Family Guy up .7
Cleveland Show up .6

Looks like the smallest difference in the Sunday Night Football programming, but that’s not a surprise — folks like to watch that live and tend to DVR only if they have to work or go to an event of some sort or something like that.

Another potential factor for the decisions on show’s fates, possibly (provided, as you say, these numbers are correct)? Maybe… time will tell. Either way, interesting numbers.