Dive Brief:
- Last fall comScore and Rentrak announced an acquisition in a bid to compete with Nielsen. According to Ad Exchanger, the $768 million deal is now complete after receiving shareholder approval.
- The key element of the deal was creating cross-screen measurement ability by combining comScore’s behavioral data with Rentrak’s demographic and census-based information.
- Giving credence to the idea of challenging Nielsen, the merged company reaches: 120 million video-on-demand screens, 40 million TV screens and 40,000 box offices along with 260 million desktops and 160 million smartphones.
Dive Insight:
"We have heard from our clients and stakeholders across the industry, and the message has been very clear: Measurement needs to evolve," Serge Matta, CEO of comScore, said in a memo reported by Ad Exchanger. "We will provide a new model of measurement for the cross-platform world."
A stated goal of the merged company is creating a Total Home Panel that measures cross-screen viewing across smart TV devices. Currently the panel is only in 800 households with 10,000 devices, but it’s hoped that number will increase by the end of the year to as much 50,000 homes and 550,000 devices.
Linda Yaccarino, chairwoman of advertising sales at NBCUniversal, said during a presentation at AdExchanger’s Industry Preview conference, "The gap between accurate measurement and consumer behavior is bigger than ever. We are throwing this challenge out to many of you in the industry who can help extend the measure of TV currency beyond a C3 rating, which is like measuring the size of an iceberg based on only what you see rising out of the water."
For its part, Nielsen has been revamping its ratings systems to include social media, in a move that follows consumers to where they are -- mobile devices.