SPECIAL EDITION: EXPANDED NAB SHOW COVERAGE Nielsen Ready to Launch Streaming Audio Measurement Service
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800.275.2840 MORE NEWS» insideradio.com THE MOST TRUSTED NEWS IN RADIO THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 2015 SPECIAL EDITION: EXPANDED NAB SHOW COVERAGE Nielsen ready to launch streaming audio measurement service. Radio’s long and winding road to total audience measurement is nearly over. After a seven-month delay, Nielsen is about to reveal its digital audience measurement service. “The official launch is coming very soon,” Nielsen SVP of digital Jeff Wender said at the NAB Show yesterday. “The technology is there and we have the infrastructure in place.” Along with providing a more complete picture of a station’s audience, the new product will track on demand audio, podcasting and other forms of digital audio content produced by Nielsen clients. The system employs the same MRC-accredited methodology Nielsen has been using to measure online video consumption. Clients place measurement software in the media player of their streaming app or web browser, which captures listening data at the closest point to the actual consumption. Four basic metrics will be included in the streaming audience reports: Reach (number of listeners, sessions and quarter hours); Demographics (gender and age by daypart), Duration (Time Spent Listening) and Location (metro or DMA). Several of the largest streaming backbone providers, including Triton Digital and Wide Orbit, have integrated the software into the media players used by thousands of radio stations. A number of broadcasters are receiving preview data. “We built this new software so we get the best understanding of who is consuming the content,” Wender said. “We can capture all the juicy details so we can help paint the picture so you can make smart choices and make better advertising transactions.” Under the hood of Nielsen’s new digital audio measurement service. Nielsen’s new streaming audio measurement service will provide an alternative to Triton Digital’s Webcast Metrics, which has long served as the industry scorecard. Nielsen’s new product will provide more demographic data than Triton, without relying on clients to collect the data themselves. It instead will tap technology widely used in the digital display and video advertising worlds. When a user launches a stream, Nielsen measurement software is automatically activated and begins collecting the necessary info: the station’s unique identifier, the length of the listening session and timestamps. It also detects an ID number unique to each listener, a technology first developed by Apple and Google for mobile advertising. That ID or key is sent to Facebook, which has a partnership with Nielsen and stores the same keys for its own user base. Facebook then matches the audience keys against its database and reports back to Nielsen the demographics of the streaming audience in aggregate form so individual users can’t be identified. To provide checks and balances, Nielsen will incorporate proprietary data from an internal calibration panel. After a lack of industry consensus about how digital audio data should be reported in the Mediaocean and Strata buying systems used by agencies, Nielsen has now clarified how it will differentiate between the different ad models used by webcasters. For streams that simulcast the same content and ads as their on-air broadcast, Nielsen will report their digital and on air listening – both separately and combined. Audience metrics for stations doing digital ad insertion won’t be combined and will be displayed in a separate tab. “Depending on the different type of advertising system that you put in place, we’ll measure both and make that information available,” Nielsen SVP of digital Jeff Wender said. Study: Radio prevails in connected car. AM/FM radio remains the primary entertainment option in the car, where roughly half of all radio listening takes place, while connected sources like internet radio are secondary. So says new data from Strategy Analytics presented at the NAB Show. Eight in ten (79%) survey respondents called broadcast radio a “must have” in their car, far and away the top entertainment product of eight measured. Interest in having a CD player is “falling off rapidly” [email protected] | 800.275.2840 PG 1 NEWS insideradio.com THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 2015 the new report says, in favor of music consumed on iPods and smartphones. While radio still rules the road, 58% of U.S. smartphone owners report using apps while driving and there is a growing desire for connected cars that make it easier to use them on the road. Nearly four in ten (37%) consider access to smartphones apps through the vehicle’s interface a “must have” feature for their next car. More entertainment options aren’t turning listeners away from broadcast radio, the data shows. For instance, 79% of consumers who listen to CD players and 76% that listen to internet radio in the car also listen daily to AM/FM radio. “The very users who want smartphone access in the car are the biggest radio users,” Lanctot said. The study also uncovered a strong appetite for local information services in the car. Seven in ten daily radio users said they are very interested in real time traffic available through their car’s infotainment system, while 65% want info about local gas availability and 61% for local weather. ‘Apple and Google are not going to take over the car.’ Nearly every automaker is building Apple’s CarPlay and Android Auto into their connected cars. But the two tech titans aren’t about to take over the car, according to a leading auto industry analyst. Roger Lanctot, associate director global automotive for Strategy Analytics, says automakers are including the operating systems in their cars to accommodate their Apple- and Android-loving customers. But that won’t slow the propagation of their own proprietary systems, like Ford Sync and Toyota Entune Carmakers favor their own system because they allow them “to curate the user experience in the car, and to infuse it with contextual information collected from the user and the car,” Lanctot said at the NAB Show. Lanctot forecast “more confusion” ahead, especially for motorists trying to find AM/FM radio through what can be layers of touch screens. “What you will see is more confusion in the car, not less, but the car solutions will get better and automakers will get the user experience solved.” Lanctot also sees “a farewell to knobs” in the digital dashboard, replaced by touch screen icons. Though they may have to dig a little to locate the radio, “people are finding it” he said. The challenge for radio will be to leverage its content across all the new in-car platforms. He suggested broadcasters and automakers work together to “bring radio forward” in the digital dashboard. “If we know what’s happening, maybe we can take advantage of this new opportunity for radio.” What’s keeping FM off the iPhone? It’s not you, it’s me may sound like a cliché breakup line but the radio industry actually wants to get back together with Apple. The prospects of that happening may be slim, however, as the tech giant remains the biggest hurdle to getting FM on more smartphones. Apple may’ve embraced HD Radio song tagging, but to date it has shown little interest in aligning itself with broadcasters once again. Based on his discussions with the company, Emmis chief technology officer Paul Brenner believes it now views FM as a “legacy and non-sexy medium.” Adding to that is that Apple gets anti-FM messages from big carriers like AT&T, who’d rather sell higher-priced streaming plans to consumers. “The Apple non-success can’t be put on the carrier — it’s on us,” Brenner told the NAB Show, noting that the tech company also worries about a lack of industry cohesion and commitment. “If we walked in and every station in America was providing song tagging and innovating without them, they would talk to us,” Brenner added. NAB Labs reported this week that only 19% of smartphones sold last year had FM capabilities activated. And of the 67% that don’t, two-thirds of those are iPhones. NAB Labs senior director Skip Pizzi believes without Apple onboard, sales of FM-enabled phones are unlikely to go much beyond the current eight million-per quarter plateau. Brenner said the industry is still working to convince Apple, but the odds remain long until more of the cell phone companies push them. “We have to walk through the door with a wheelbarrow full of innovation, and we have a pail,” he said. “In order for Apple to make that change, in their minds, they have to feel like we’re not riding their backs to win that innovation.” [email protected] | 800.275.2840 PG 2 NEWS insideradio.com THURSDAY, APRIL 16, 2015 Deal volume cut in half in Q1 as multiples show little movement. Sellers, buyers and brokers poured into Las Vegas over the next week for the NAB Show. They arrive during a deal market that has slowed considerably in recent months. During the first quarter 72 radio deals were filed, a 49% decline over the first three months of 2014. SNL Kagan data shows what deals did get struck were smaller in size. The total value of this year’s transactions was $147.8 million, compared to a total that exceeded $327 million a year ago. “There’s been an appetite for deals over the last several years, but it seems like a lot of that has been flushed out of the market,” senior analyst Justin Nielson says. One radio group head bound for the NAB Show says, “I have a lot of meetings with brokers but there is not a lot of inventory out there,” he says.