BSkyB Initiative Drives Audience Measurement Forward
BSkyB’s plans to begin measuring satellite television viewing with an audience panel four times the size of that currently used by BARB has received a warm response from many senior industry figures.
The new panel will be largest of its kind in the UK and will comprise 20,000 households, compared to just over 5,000 for BARB. However, BSkyB claims it will not act as a substitute for the existing industry-wide trading currency.
The BSkyB panel will be used to monitor the viewing habits of digital satellite subscribers. It will also enable the company to examine the effect of subscription upgrades, Sky Plus boxes and second set-top-box subscriptions.
Commenting on the initiative, Mark Chippendale, director of sales at BSkyB’s advertising sales division, Sky Media, said: “This innovative initiative will deepen understanding of digital audiences and demonstrate to marketers the potential return on investment offered by advertising on multi-channel television.”
Sky’s entry into audience research was first mooted in January and will provide the most accurate audience data yet for the 18.5 million UK viewers in digital satellite households. The system will be run by both Sky and market information specialist TNS (see BSkyB To Launch UK’s Largest Audience Panel).
TNS will provide measurement of the brands purchased by individuals across a wide range of categories including FMCG and clothing. Sky will combine it’s own information on viewing with this purchasing data to demonstrate to brand owners the value of its audiences and deliver greater accountability to clients.
Mike Gorton, head of television and radio audience measurement at TNS, said: “We are delighted to be working with Sky to develop and operate this new system, which represents a real step forward in television audience measurement. It is the first time a panel has been created that is large enough to measure viewers’ use of satellite and interactive television services to a satisfactory level of detail.”
The initiative has been warmly welcomed by those in the industry and Toby Hack, head of interactive at OMDtvi, said: “It’s interesting because there are obviously a lot more people on the Sky panel than there are on the BARB multi-channel panel. It will also show up differences between the two panels in terms of viewing trends.”
He added: “It will also give a better idea of what people are doing interactively, in terms of whether they are engaging with commercials or using games. At the moment we can tell how many people make a call through the box and transact, but the new panel will let us know how many are browsing, searching and then making the decision whether to transact or not as a result. That really will add a whole new dimension to the understanding of interactive media.”
Gary Roddy, research director at Interactive Digital Sales, is also excited about Sky’s foray into interactive measurement. He said: “We are currently looking at a project on getting people to respond to surveys using the red button, but the logistics are quite a way from being complete so watching what Sky do will be very interesting for us.”
He added: “I think it has the potential to be brilliant, they’ve got the infrastructure, they’ve got the boxes so they’re all set up to do it. Cost wise they will make a huge saving in having all of that already in place, but it won’t compete with BARB.”
Lynne Robinson, research director at the IPA, explained that Sky’s system is so far not able to map demographics to viewing figures and that it is not a direct competitor to BARB. She said: “I think it is an extremely interesting tool, we’re looking forward to setting it up and being able to use it. Sky will be able to give very defined data on interactive users and they will also be able to get a much better fix on the viewing for smaller channels because it’s a much larger sample size.”
She added: “It is not designed to replace BARB by any means, it is to give added insight into other aspects of television viewing and also to hook into TNS’ data on shopping impacts. We’re very much looking forward to it.”
In addition to providing purchasing data on participants, TNS will be responsible for the design, recruitment and maintenance of the viewing panel, the processing of data and the delivery of results to BSkyB. Data from the panel will be analysed by bespoke versions of InfoSysTV, TNS’ flexible television audience analysis system.
BSkyB: 0207 705 3000 www.sky.com
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