Industry consultation shapes BARB’s measurement plans
From September 2018 BARB, the TV audience measurement organisation, will for the first time begin reporting the number of people watching programmes across four screens.
Confirming the next stage of ‘Project Dovetail’, BARB said on Thursday the development builds on the successful beta reporting that has been in place since 2015. The new measurement capabilities include TV sets, tablets, PCs and smartphones for on demand and live streaming.
Writing for Mediatel, BARB’s CEO, Justin Sampson said: “From this September, we will start to report the number of people watching programmes across four screens.
“Having delivered this, the next priority for Project Dovetail will be to deliver an equivalent measure for viewing online TV commercials; this will mean the industry can assess the total reach and frequency of advertising campaigns across multiple screens.”
BARB is responsible for delivering an independent audience currency for the UK television and advertising industry.
Its viewing figures are used by advertisers, agencies and programme makers to evaluate their annual investment of £7.5bn in the production and distribution of TV shows and commercials.
However, as viewing behaviours have changed and new entrants have entered the market, BARB has faced fresh challenges. [advert position=”left”]
To that end, BARB was asked whether its data collection and reporting techniques can be applied to the AV delivered by platforms such as Facebook and YouTube.
In response, BARB commissioned a cross-industry consultation with advertisers, agencies, broadcasters and social media platforms.
The outcome, explained in detail by Sampson in his article for Mediatel, sets out the strict expectations that advertisers and agencies have for a cross-platform audience currency.
It essentially lays down a list of challenges and criteria for newer video platforms to overcome, such as strict brand safety rules.
Last month, Matt Brittin, president, EMEA business & operations at Google, which owns YouTube, said his team had been in discussions with measurement bodies around Europe for some time.
“We are really keen on seeing these partnerships happen,” he said. “Not for lack of trying on our side, we want these partnerships to happen.
“Having a commonly accepted way to measure YouTube and TV usage is going to be beneficial for everybody. These are not easy problems but we are keen on seeing progress here.”
Asked to respond to this week’s announcement, Ronan Harris, Google UK MD, said the business was “totally committed” to providing its advertisers and agency partners with independent measurement that compares TV and online video side by side.
“We firmly believe it’s in the ad industry’s best interest to have unified video audience measurement metrics,” he said.
“In Germany, YouTube will be measured alongside TV by AGF, the Joint Industry Committee (JIC) this year, capturing the rapid growth of consumer time on online video platforms. Providing transparency and visibility to all our advertising and agency partners is important to us, so we will continue to work with the wider industry to find ways to meet the industry’s needs.”
Meanwhile, a Facebook spokesperson told Mediatel: “Consumers are driving change with consumption across devices, platforms and formats. Advertisers in turn want to understand how their video marketing efforts are being consumed across all these channels, and each other’s context to one another.
“These are regular conversations that we have with our partners, and we are wholly supportive of industry measurement evolving to reflect a cross-channel world.
“The positive work being conducted by BARB in talking to the UK industry about its measurement needs, including for platforms such as our own, is welcomed. We would like to see these conversations continue to evolve and look forward to ongoing discussions with the industry to address the needs of advertisers.”
Sampson added: “The consultation has provided a very clear reading on the industry’s expectations…it’s in this context that we welcome conversations with any content owners and platforms.”
Industry will be watching closely to see what happens next, but at this stage it is obvious that both YouTube and Facebook would have to overcome some challenges before they would be ready to be measured in the same way as more traditional broadcasters in the UK.
Issues over brand safety, context, the policing of user generated content, and the sheer scale of unregulated video uploaded daily are clear barriers.