Radio age research, manufacturing, communications, broadcasting, television (1941)

Then the wide discrepancies in the ratings create new interest and the confusion is compounded. A case in point was the ratings muddle which fol- lowed NBC's "Satins and Spurs", the first of our color spectaculars. Here was the opening of a new era in programming and it was only natural that there should be wide interest in the overnight Trendex ratings which were widely printed in the radio and television trade press. Later the Nielsen and ARB reports came out for the same broadcast and wide differences in the figures raised questions regarding the accuracy of all ratings. Trendex reported a rating of 17.5; then Nielsen re- ported 38.7; and finally, ARB reported between the two with a rating of 26.7. These, at first blush, were startling differences. Actually, however, there was little conflict between these ratings from a research point of view. For example, the Trendex rating of 17.5 was based on a telephone survey in ten cities and represented the percentage of telephone homes viewing during the aver- age minute of the program. For the purpose of com- parison, we obtained a special rating from Nielsen, one which was reasonably comparable to the Trendex rating since it was based on nine cities that have three-network competition. The Nielsen nine-city rating on an average- minute basis was 21.5, so it was a little higher than the Trendex rating, but at least within shooting distance. The difference lay in the fact that the Trendex rating was based on telephone homes only within the city. The Nielsen nine-city rating, on the other hand, was based on the entire station area, including both telephone and non-telephone homes within the city and outside it in the rural areas and small towns. Again we took the ARB rating of 26.7 and put it on a comparable footing to the Nielsen rating. The ARB figure was obtained on a basis of an average quarter hour. With a special tabulation, ARB made it a rating for the entire hour and a half. The ARB figure then became 34.0, which was reasonably close to the Nielsen rating of 38.7. Thus the ratings from the three services can be compared only if they are put on a comparable basis and this can be done only with analyses which generally are not available to the public. This kind of detailed break- down goes a long way toward explaining the differences in the rating figures. Minor discrepancies remain, but these can be attributed largely to diffetences in technique. Ratings Generally Accurate The blame for the confusion, therefore, lies less with the ratings services than with those who misinterpret their findings. The fact is that the television ratings are generally quite accurate. The major reason for this ac- curacy lies in the nature of the medium itself. When we are dealing with the printed word, determining readership is a tremendous problem. That problem is to find out how many people have read a magazine, say, over a period of days, weeks, or even months. In broad- casting, however, everyone who tunes in does so with a brief, specified period, whether five minutes, fifteen minutes, or what have you. This greatly simplifies the research problem. Instead of trying to trace readership over an indefinite period we need only determine the audience at a given time. The problem in radio and television is not so much to find the means of measuring audience as to decide which of several methods to use. At NBC we rely most heavily on the Nielsen service. The objectivity of the Nielsen method, its wide coverage, its exhaustive anal- yses and its broad acceptance by advertisers and agencies, combine to make it the most valuable of the services. In addition, for such supplemental data as audience composition and for the purpose of cross-checking, we use both Trendex and ARB. In the future we will continue to use the rating services as guides to the growth of television. We will use them not as the final word in distinguishing success from failure, but as a tool to temper and reinforce judg- ment. We will use them in the knowledge that, though their methods and measurements differ, each serves a useful function. NBC's Hugh M. Beville, Jr., discusses Nielsen-assembled data with H. W. Shepard of NBC, and John K. Churchill of A. C. Nielsen Company. 24 RADIO AGE