Nielsen Aims to Link Commercials to Actual Sales With New Offering

Nielsen has long been known for counting the number of people who watch TV shows and the commercials that accompany them. Now it hopes to be recognized for helping advertisers determine whether their spots actually spurred a consumer to make a purchase or similar decision tied to sales.

The measurement giant said Thursday that it would launch technology that help marketers and media buyers understand whether a commercial spurred a specific outcome, such as requesting more information about a product, visiting a showroom or car dealership, or actually making a purchase.

Advertisers and TV networks have been pursuing such information for years. In 2018, Discovery Communications, Fox News, A + E Networks, AMC Networks, CBS ,  and Disney were among the media companies that pursued a trial of technology that sought to tie exposure to video ads to an actual customer action. A+E last year offered to analyze attention, recall and search engagement via data from TVision, a company that analyzes how viewers watch TV; Brand Effect; and EDO, an analytics company founded by actor Ed Norton that has forged several alliances with media  companies and marketers trying to understand audience behaviors.

Nielsen expects to include the new technology in Nielsen One, its new audience analysis product that incorporates a range of new data aimed at tabulating audiences across linear and digital video.

Realeyes will provide information tha helps clients understand of attention and emotive response across platforms, and also identify specific elements of the campaign and creative that proved most engaging to consumers.

“Our Outcomes Marketplace is the latest example of how we are innovating to make it easier to measure what truly matters: real business results,” said Nichole Henderson, general manager of global campaign analytics at Nielsen, in a statement. “Working with industry leaders like Realeyes will allow our clients to seamlessly connect powerful metrics for quick, actionable insights of their campaigns’ outcomes, all in an open, interoperable ecosystem. It’s one more way Nielsen is powering the future of measurement.”

Nielsen expects to unveil other providers of outcome measurement later in the year.

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