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WXIA Drops Nielsen for Comscore

R

RoddyFreeman

Tegna and therefore WXIA have signed a multi-year contract with Comscore for TV and cross-platform measurement.

With this move, 2 Atlanta stations, WXIA and WANF, now use Comscore and not Nielsen.

As a media buyer, I find Comscore's ratings very inflated so for WXIA and WANF, their ratings will look better. While these 2 stations have been ratings challenged, all Tegna and Gray TV stations, including some with top ratings, are using Comscore.
 
I've never pondered having more than one set of ratings in a market. How does this work for you as a buyer? If WSB-TV and WXIA are competing for a buy, are you forced to treat the two ratings systems are equivalent?
 
PTBoardOp93 said:
I've never pondered having more than one set of ratings in a market. How does this work for you as a buyer? If WSB-TV and WXIA are competing for a buy, are you forced to treat the two ratings systems are equivalent?
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Major ad agencies buy based on 1 of the 2 ratings services, and they see the ratings of all stations in a market. I believe virtually all of the big agencies use Nielsen. As far as I know, Comscore's TV service is still not accredited by the Media Ratings Council.

If a station does not subscribe to Nielsen, they are not allowed to show Nielsen ratings on their availabilities or pitch to buyers based on Nielsen. But the agencies whose policy is to buy off Nielsen would use the Nielsen numbers to make decisions.

I'm a small business so when the stations submit proposals to me, they show the ratings. If they subscribe to Nielsen, they of course show Nielsen ratings. If they subscribe to Comscore only, that makes it more difficult for me. If they recently switched from Nielsen to Comscore, I use their recent Nielsen ratings to calculate how much higher their Comscore ratings are, and then apply that factor to the Comscore numbers. If it's been a while since they switched, I call competing stations that use Nielsen and ask them to give me some of the current numbers (of the former Nielsen subscribers) in order to come up with a factor.
 
PTBoardOp93 said:
I've never pondered having more than one set of ratings in a market. How does this work for you as a buyer? If WSB-TV and WXIA are competing for a buy, are you forced to treat the two ratings systems are equivalent?
Click to expand...
Arbitron used to supply television ratings but abandoned the practice and sticks to radio only. I don't recall major differences between them and Nielsen. However, I can definitely see why 11 Alive and Atlanta News First would want a ratings service that makes them look better. I'm not as up on WANF as a CBS affiliate, but WXIA's perpetual third place is why WSB is the ABC affiliate, and things haven't changed much since the switch took place in 1980.
 
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