Nielsen Firms Build 'First' Single-Source Radio Measure

In the US, shopper insight specialist Nielsen Catalina Solutions (NCS) has teamed up with Nielsen Audio (formerly Arbitron) to launch what the firms describe as the first single-source measurement approach built for the radio industry.

Nielsen Audio's Portable People Meter (PPM) detects inaudible watermarks embedded in the audio portion of a broadcast program or commercial, and tracks what station was heard at what time. This listener information for specific commercials will now be linked to NCS's frequent shopper data on 60 million households in a single source view, to determine how the radio ads influenced the sales of products purchased in the listener's household.

The approach was piloted with radio broadcaster Clear Channel Media and Entertainment last year, and results showed that for every dollar spent on advertising, there was a sales return of six dollars on average for those exposed to the ads in the prior 28 day period. The study also showed that the closer the exposure is to purchase, the higher the response, and that African Americans and Hispanics showed higher responses to exposure.

Leslie Wood (pictured), Chief Research Officer, Nielsen Catalina Solutions, comments: 'The advertising industry has longed for a much more comprehensive understanding of the effectiveness of audio advertising. Our single-source measurement solution will help advertisers better understand where their ad spend will have the most sales impact and can best be used for future campaigns.'

Web sites: www.nielsen.com and www.ncsolutions.com .