Report: Ratings Services Are 'In Crisis'

Linda Yaccarino

With TV viewing falling off a cliff but with more homes watching video than ever, NBC’s top ad boss, Linda Yaccarino, said the cross-platform TV-to-digital measurement industry is in “acute crisis,” according to The NY Post.

Yaccarino, who is chairman of advertising sales and client partnerships at NBCUniversal, told advertising executives at the IAB Mixx conference in New York, “I think there’s a lack of leadership with the measurement situation.”

NBCU’s financial news outlet CNBC is giving Nielsen the boot next month and switching to Cogent to provide it with out-of-home viewing statistics to help it sell advertising.

Yaccarino said that network’s Nielsen ratings were based on just nine homes in the measurement sample that represents TV viewing across the nation.

NBCUniversal’s issue is that viewers are watching on iPads and via video-on-demand platforms, but while VOD viewing is measured, Nielsen isn’t counting mobile views.

The NBCU executive also appeared to hint that CNBC might not be the only outlet to end its reliance on Nielsen data.