Rentrak says it is starting a first-of-its-kind TV measuring service, estimating all TV viewership of a program for up to one month.
The upstart Portland, Ore.-based media researcher says its new TV viewing service, Total Audience Viewing Report, will combine time-shifted and video-on-demand viewing showing “increased viewing from the total audience for all ad-supported prime time network and cable programs over seven, 14 and 28 days.”
“We believe in leaving no ‘eyeballs’ behind and realize that DVR and VOD viewing continues to grow greatly beyond seven days,” said Bill Livek, chief executive officer of Rentrak, in a release. “With a report that looks at a month of TV viewing, both networks and their agency clients can discover the true audience shift and lift beyond a week.”
Rentrak says no other TV viewing report has shown the total audience viewing lift of program audiences over a month period of time.
Some examples: CW’s “The Vampire Diaries” showed that more than half of the total audience — within 28 days came from DVRs and VOD. ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy,” Fox’s “New Girl” and NBC’s “Revolution” had more than one-third of its audience coming from DVR and VOD.
Some cable programs posted stronger numbers. TNT’s “Rizzoli & Iles” and FX’s “Sons of Anarchy” each had 60% of its 28-day total coming from DVR and VOD; Bravo’s “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” Comedy Central’s “Tosh.0,” Syfy’s “Haven,” MTV’s “Teen Mom 2,” USA Network’s “Burn Notice,” A&E’s “Duck Dynasty” and BET’s “Sister Wives” had half of their respective total audiences after 28 days coming from DVR and VOD.
Rentrak says The Total Audience Report factors in live audience numbers, VOD audience and DVR playback from its base 22 million television homes and census-based video-on-demand behavior from over 100 million TVs.
Source: Media Post, 2/20/13
