Nielsen OKs Using Amazon Data For Thursday Night Football

Nielsen is planning to incorporate viewing data from streaming services for live programming, a move that will likely boost the ratings for Amazon Prime Video’s “Thursday Night Football” package and allow it to charge more for commercials.

“We are making modifications for live streaming measurement to more accurately reflect the growing impact of streaming and first-party data,” Nielsen said in a written statement.  

The Wall Street Journal reports this is the first time Nielsen has agreed to use a company’s own data along with its independent research to publicly report ratings. It only applies for live programming on streaming services and is open to other streamers as well. 

Last season, Amazon’s ratings using its own data were nearly 18% higher than Nielsen’s when it came to “Thursday Night Football.”  

Before Nielsen can start incorporating Amazon data into its own research, the Media Rating Council, which sets measurement standards, needs to finish its review and give its blessing, which could come as early as next week.

Nielsen’s decision to accept first-party data came after lobbying by Amazon and the National Football League to include first-person data in its ratings, people familiar with the matter said. The NFL has been aggressively pushing Nielsen on its measurement of pro football on all of its networks for the past few years, and has even commissioned studies with the ratings company to improve accuracy.