By the year 2011, Nielsen Co. plans to triple the size of its National People Meter (NPM) TV-ratings panel. By that same year, the company says it will have Local People Meters (LPM) in 56 markets and those sample homes will be integrated into the national sample.
According to an article from Multichannel News, the company is trying to “increase the accuracy of its numbers and to provide more flexibility for measuring non-traditional television viewing.”
Why is this important?
It will help Nielsen accomplish many of the objectives of its Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement (A2/M2) initiative, which seeks to measure televised video as it moves beyond the television set in the home to the Internet, hand-held devices and to platforms outside the house.
Imagine, your station might one day get credit for the video it posts online, sends to cell phones and other delivery systems not yet conceived.
Right now, Nielsen’s schedule for LPM expansion is “three more markets in 2007, five in 2008, 12 in 2009, 12 in 2010 and 14 in 2011.”
