Episode 209
The 5 Nielsen Hacks No One Told You About (Until Now) | Jon Miller, Vice President, Audience Insights – Nielsen Audio.
Radio ratings are about to shift—and in a good way. Nielsen’s Jon Miller joins BRANDwidth On Demand to reveal the five most important changes broadcasters need to know now. From the new Three Minute Rule (yes, it could instantly bump your ratings) to how wearables and mobile diaries are modernizing measurement, Jon gives us a front-row seat to Nielsen’s evolving approach to audio.
If you're in radio, podcasting, or media buying, this is your roadmap to the future of audience insights—and how to make sure your brand gets credit where credit is due.
🧠In This Episode:
- How the Three Minute Rule is changing audience credit in PPM markets
- Why mobile diary options could reshape smaller markets
- Nielsen's partnership with Edison and why Share of Ear data matters
- How AI is already being used in audio attribution and analysis
- Why radio still dominates ad-supported audio (yes, really—70% of it!)
- What the industry can expect from the Nielsen One project
One-Minute Martinizing (tap here)
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Transcript
The goal of Nielsen 1 in the future is to be able to measure everything and to truly give what they call unduplicated reach.
Speaker B:Brand with On Demand Rebooting radio with a different take on all radio can be.
Speaker A:Sure there might be better algorithms out there on Spotify or other places.
Speaker A:Sure, podcasts are amazing and give you access to things you can't get anywhere else.
Speaker A:But the local nature of radio, the local community, the ability to connect, that I think is the key.
Speaker A:As long as radio keeps that in its sights, I think radio will be just fine.
Speaker B:Now your guides through the mediamorphosis, David Martin and author of the book Brand with media branding coach Kipper McGee.
Speaker C:Well, this time we welcome John Miller, vice president of audio insights at Nielsen.
Speaker C:He'll be discussing the fascinating changes in audience measurement that are reshaping the radio industry.
Speaker C:In fact, all audio.
Speaker C:As media consumption shifts and evolves, understanding how audiences are captured and has never been more critical.
Speaker C:John will share how Nielsen is adapting its methodologies, including PPM and diary markets, to help you make the most of their data.
Speaker C:With new platforms like podcasting and streaming becoming major factors, even YouTube emerging as an audience hub, how can radio stay ahead of the game?
Speaker C:John's insights into upcoming trends and tools are a must hear for anyone committed to the future of audio.
Speaker C:So let's dive right into it.
Speaker C:How can we keep radio relevant, resilient and ready for what's next?
Speaker C:Brand with On Demand is proud to welcome Nielsen Audio maven, John Miller.
Speaker D:Hey, John.
Speaker D:Welcome guys.
Speaker A:Thank you.
Speaker A:Great to be here.
Speaker A:I appreciate the introduction.
Speaker A:So I will take that as a question and just jump right in if you'd like.
Speaker D:Oh, go for it.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, sure.
Speaker A:So at Nielsen, of course, our task is to have the best measurement possible to give the industry the best tools.
Speaker A:And so we're doing a lot of things.
Speaker A:And I'll talk about this on two sides, I think one is fundamentally methodologically, you know, we have moved in our PPM markets, we have moved to entirely a wearable technology.
Speaker A:So the PPM meter is now a wearable.
Speaker A:It used to be a pager type device you would carry around and you get incentivized to do that.
Speaker A:Now it's a wearable device.
Speaker A:Think of a smartwatch or something like that.
Speaker A:So that is a huge update in terms of usability, ease of compliance.
Speaker A:So PPM markets are now 100% wearable.
Speaker A:And in diary markets, we are moving towards having a mobile option available, meaning that people can still fill out paper pencil diaries.
Speaker A:Because there are certain groups that respond best with a literal hard copy diary.
Speaker A:But we also want to make it available to others to do it from a mobile device.
Speaker A:So those are some of the background things we're doing again to think about how can we get better response rates, how can we keep younger consumers in particular part of our surveys and responding the way we need them to be?
Speaker A:So from a methodology standpoint, those are the things we've really been focused on and spending money on the last few years.
Speaker D:Yeah, that's really interesting.
Speaker D:And along with that too, you've tried to broaden the scope with your total audience thing.
Speaker D:So how is that framework evolving to account for kind of the growing diversity with all the platforms you talked about?
Speaker A:Sure, yeah, great point.
Speaker A:So I talked about kind of like the heart hardware part of it, if you will, like how do we literally, you know, survey people and get them to record their habits, but from the other side of things, which is data and fusion and methodology and how do you bring different platforms together even if you don't measure them all in the same place?
Speaker A:So that's been also a big focus because as you said, the audio landscape continues to evolve, continues to get bigger.
Speaker A:Radio is still a huge part of it, but there are so many other places people can get their audio.
Speaker A:So we're doing a lot of different things.
Speaker A:And I'll start by talking about our partnership with, with Edison Research.
Speaker A:So as you probably know, Edison is, you know, a really well known research company.
Speaker A:They own some of the podcast space.
Speaker A:They also have an amazing product called the Share of Ear, which is something that's been going on for 10 years that looks at how do you spend your time with audio.
Speaker A:So we partner with Edison now, we produce insights together.
Speaker A:So those kind of share of time insights are now part of our insights as well.
Speaker A:For example, the latest data that we have, which is from Q3 of this year, talks about of the daily time people spend with ad supported audio, which by the way is a key difference.
Speaker A:Right, because some of those things you Talked about, like YouTube or, you know, when you pay for Spotify, you don't get served ads.
Speaker A:So from an advertising perspective, that's not really a, that's not really in play.
Speaker A:So ad supported is so important.
Speaker A:So of all the daily ads supported time people are spending with audio, radio gets almost 70% of that on a daily basis.
Speaker A:People talk about radio listening is changing, right?
Speaker A:Competition is increasing, fragmentation is happening.
Speaker A:And yet almost 70% of all the daily time we spend with ad supported audio is going to radio.
Speaker A:And podcasts is Next, it's number two, but it's at 20%, so it's a pretty big difference.
Speaker A:So we partner with Edison to have their insights.
Speaker A:We're also working behind the scenes to bring some of their data into the planning tools that get used out there.
Speaker A:So right now it's hard in some of the planning tools to account for podcasts and to account for streaming audio.
Speaker A:And we're working to make that easier to do so that if you're a media buyer, you can plan and buy on not just radio, but also podcasting and also streaming audio and potentially YouTube, because, you know, that's our goal, is to make all the data available to the industry and to the planners and the buyers.
Speaker C:What are some of the biggest challenges that you guys face in Nielsen when trying to track all of this across all these multiple platforms?
Speaker A:Right, That's a great question.
Speaker A:And that's something that Nielsen faces across the board.
Speaker A:On the viewing side, it's maybe even more challenging.
Speaker A:Think about all the ways, all the places you can get viewing content now.
Speaker A:So to give a simpler answer, you know, where Nielsen can't measure it themselves, first person, we rely on third person, third party sources.
Speaker A:We use big data, we bring in other data sets.
Speaker A:You know, we have an entire data science team and that's their job, is to figure out how to synthesize, how to put together all these data sets that make sense.
Speaker A:I mean, that's the world that we live in today.
Speaker A:You know, the most valuable companies in the world now produce data, right?
Speaker A:They produce metrics and there's so much data, there's so much big data floating around out there.
Speaker A:So at Nielsen, we're working really hard to figure out, you know, what makes the most sense, what can we combine with our traditional Hannel based ratings to give us that deeper understanding.
Speaker A:Because the long term goal, you might have heard some of this kicked about, Nielsen has a project called Nielsen One.
Speaker A:And the goal of Nielsen One in the future is to be able to measure everything and to be able to truly give what they call unduplicated reach.
Speaker A:So to literally, like on a, on the video side, be able to find a way technologically to measure the show Yellowstone, which you can find in a hundred different places.
Speaker A:You can watch it live, right?
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker A:You can watch it on demand, you can watch it on Rerun, you can watch it on Xfinity, you can watch it on Amazon, you can watch it here, you can watch it there.
Speaker A:Like, how do you, how do you tag all of those pieces of content so you can capture It.
Speaker A:So from a methodology standpoint, that's a big undertaking and we are working towards that.
Speaker A:And then how do you synthesize all that data together to give unduplicated reach?
Speaker A:Like, that's the Holy grail that advertisers have always wanted.
Speaker A:Because today, you know, we have TV measured one way, radio measured another.
Speaker A:All the different platforms come in through different pipes, if you will.
Speaker A:How do you get a true unduplicated number?
Speaker A:If you're an advertiser and you're running a campaign that ran across different platforms over the air, streamed on demand, all these things, how do you get a true read on who caught the ads?
Speaker A:Big.
Speaker A:So that's a part of the plan for the future, is to move towards that.
Speaker A:And we're making progress.
Speaker A:It takes a while to turn an aircraft carrier, Nielsen's an aircraft carrier, but we're working towards it.
Speaker A:We're working towards it.
Speaker D:Any kind of ETA and when that might be, I mean, we're looking like five years or 25 years.
Speaker D:What are you thinking?
Speaker A:Yeah, not 25 years.
Speaker A:And I can tell you that Nielsen's already made a ton of progress on the video side because that's the core of Nielsen's business.
Speaker A:Audio isn't really important part, but, you know, the core of Nielsen's business is TV ratings.
Speaker A:And so, you know, we already have in the marketplace multiple products that do some of what I'm talking about, this Nielsen One project is in the process of rolling out in some ways in video, and that's been five or six years of development to get it to this point.
Speaker A:So, you know, we're still in the implementation and planning stage for audio.
Speaker A:It's not going to be 25 years, but it's not ready yet.
Speaker A:So in the meantime, where can we make a difference?
Speaker A:How can we bring in the best available data?
Speaker A:That's how Nielsen thinks of it, is like, this is currently our best available data.
Speaker A:And then in the future, we might have something better.
Speaker A:But for now, let's give the industry the best that we have.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker D:But with all of these various metrics now.
Speaker D:And of course, if somebody does see, for example, a Yellowstone spot, like on their phone and on tv, that would count as two impressions still, because they're seeing it twice.
Speaker D:Right.
Speaker A:Well, it's also so complicated because there's no guarantee it's the same ad either.
Speaker A:That's where this gets so much more complicated.
Speaker A:Think about, like, programmatic.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker D:Okay.
Speaker A:Think about how you get served things right.
Speaker A:You get served an ad based on the device you're on based on your geography.
Speaker A:So it is infinitely more complicated than it ever used to be.
Speaker A:So again, Nielsen's hard to work writing all the code to figure that out and using AI to help us.
Speaker A:But yeah, it is.
Speaker A:It is not as simple as just a one to one.
Speaker A:You were on the TV show, this spot aired, everyone must have seen it.
Speaker A:It's not that simple anymore.
Speaker D:So.
Speaker D:So shifting gears back to audio, is AI somehow also being used on the station side or on your customer side to kind of siphon?
Speaker D:Like back when I was doing station side PPM analysis, you know, we'd go through, you know, minute by minute and see which things were working and calendaring out stuff and seeing where the hotspots were weak spots.
Speaker D:Is AI being implemented by anybody right now?
Speaker D:Are there any smart people that are doing interesting things?
Speaker D:Are there any devices, are there any software programs, kind of like we used to have the programmers package back in the day?
Speaker D:Any AI tools like that that being thought of or in development?
Speaker A:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker A:And I can tell you we use AI internally at Nielsen, like everybody does, to help us be better and more efficient, help us crunch data, help us solve more complex problems.
Speaker A:So like the rest of the world, we're certainly using it.
Speaker A:It's our methodology.
Speaker A:And what we do is still very much based on the judgment of all the people that have worked here all these years.
Speaker A:But I can tell you, but yes, there are consultants out there in the industry that are absolutely using AI to do the things you just mentioned, to crunch minute by minute PPM data, to look at exposures, to look at attribution features.
Speaker A:So, sure, it's all happening out there.
Speaker A:Again, we're trying to use it.
Speaker A:I can only answer, really, from Nielsen, but I know that we're using it to make things easier and to be more efficient, to do less with more.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Especially when it comes to crunching big data.
Speaker A:So that's how we use it.
Speaker C:What advice do you have, John, for station people, radio people, to effectively prepare for the shifts and measurement and make the most out of all these great tools you're talking about?
Speaker A:Sure.
Speaker A:Well, I always start by talking about the importance of local audio, local radio, and just how unique that is, which is why radio continues to persist as such an important part of the audio landscape.
Speaker A:You know, you made a few comments about TV and we had a laugh earlier.
Speaker A:You know, but think about how much like broadcast TV ratings have changed outside of, and how outside of sports, it is a totally different ball game.
Speaker A:So radio in a way is in a much Better place because radio still offers stuff you cannot get anywhere else.
Speaker A:The local connection.
Speaker A:I mean, think about local sports talk radio.
Speaker A:I don't think that will ever go away.
Speaker A:I think that will always be around in some way, shape or form because there's nowhere else that offers that kind of community.
Speaker A:And so you can expand that example out to all of radio.
Speaker A:So I just want to remind everyone to keep making sure you do that.
Speaker A:Like, yes, you should pay attention to competition.
Speaker A:Yes, you should pay attention to what everyone else is doing and how audio is used.
Speaker A:But don't try to be what Spotify is.
Speaker A:Be radio.
Speaker A:You know, be what radio is and offer the things that only radio has.
Speaker A:So that said in the diary markets, we are seeing our response rates get better, we are seeing our compliance rates get better, which is great.
Speaker A:That's what we're paid to do.
Speaker A:That's why people play Nielsen.
Speaker A: coming in the second half of: Speaker A:We're gonna, we're gonna roll out the mobile survey option, which will be great.
Speaker A:Again, you know, we're not looking to impact the data, we're looking to impact the sample and make sure that we have as robust a sample as possible in PPM markets.
Speaker A:We have a whole other priority going on.
Speaker A:You might have heard about this recently called the three minute qualifier.
Speaker A:And that's a change we're making starting in January where we are adjusting the crediting rule for what it takes to be counted as a listener and therefore an advertising impression for radio.
Speaker A:And to sum it up, we're going to be changing that rule and as a result, we're going to see more audience on radio stations, service level wide.
Speaker A:So we expect average audience to be increasing around 20% by making this change.
Speaker A:And so that's going to be great.
Speaker A:It's going to look great year over year.
Speaker A:So, you know, we're upgrading the measurement to be more timely.
Speaker A:And then again, we have to go back to what I said earlier, continue doing what you can to make radio a daily destination.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:You've got a lot of competition on a daily basis, give people reasons to keep coming back every day.
Speaker A:And that's something radio has done for years.
Speaker D:So, John, for the people who may not yet be read in on the three minute rule, should you explain the difference between that and the old five minute way we used to look at things?
Speaker A:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker A:So through a lot of conversations with our clients and with the industry, our clients have been saying to us, is there a way to improve the crediting Rules.
Speaker A:And if you think about it, you know, someone today could see a video ad on TikTok and they could be on that ad for two or three seconds and be counted as an impression, right?
Speaker A:Things have changed so dramatically with digital, with mobile and radio requires five minutes of listening inside a quarter hour, inside a 15 minute block to be counted as a listener.
Speaker A:So in PPM markets we know, because it's so granular that there's a significant amount of listening that takes place that is not five minutes long.
Speaker A:So what we decided to do after looking at the data and talking with our clients and talking with the industry is we decided to change the rule from five minutes of listening in a quarter hour to down to three.
Speaker A:And just by doing that, we're expecting about a 20% increase in audience levels at the service level, meaning across PPM, you should see about 20% more audience now by changing that rule.
Speaker A:Because what you're doing is you're capturing listening that is there, that is meaningful, that is happening, but isn't currently being credited.
Speaker A:You might listen for three minutes.
Speaker A:By the way, most songs are about three minutes long, right?
Speaker A:So you might have a three minute occasion.
Speaker A:And in the current rules, that doesn't get counted.
Speaker A:So by changing that rule, by tweaking it from five minutes down to three, we're going to increase audience, we're going to capture more impressions.
Speaker A:That's the real reason why we did this, right, is to give advertisers more impressions to count against their ads.
Speaker A:But that's really the basis of it.
Speaker A:By making this small change, which makes sense, which modernizes radio measurement in today's digital age, we're not going to go to second level stuff or minute level stuff.
Speaker A:But this gets us closer.
Speaker A:As I said, you could see a video ad for a couple seconds and count as an impression and radio takes five minutes of listening.
Speaker A:So we wanted to update that and make it a little bit more modern and we think the results are going to be great.
Speaker E:Wow.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:That's incredible.
Speaker A:And in Diary, we're not making this change.
Speaker A:It's still five minutes in Diary.
Speaker A:I'm sure people listen for three minutes in Diary, but they don't write that down.
Speaker A:Diary is a recall based system and human beings don't usually recall really short occasions of anything.
Speaker A:We tend to record it in longer blocks.
Speaker A:So we don't have motivation to do this in the diary.
Speaker A:The diary's, you know, doing its job.
Speaker A:It's getting listening for us.
Speaker A:As I said, we're modernizing the tool, but we're not making this change in diary because a very small amount of the occasions we capture are less than five minutes long in a diary.
Speaker C:Nielsen's John Miller.
Speaker C:Hey, know someone who we should interview or a topic we ought to cover?
Speaker C:Well, let us know.
Speaker C:Email your suggestions to show@brandwithondemand.com or reach out on social BrandWithPlus on Instagram, Facebook and X.
Speaker C:That's BrandWithPlus.
Speaker C:BrandWithPlus.
Speaker E:Hey, are you feeling just a little bit better informed now that you've heard John tell us what's going on with Nielsen?
Speaker E:Well, if so, please pass it on to somebody else who could also use a boost in the ratings and the career department.
Speaker E:Just tell them, hit the follow button.
Speaker D:We're everywhere.
Speaker E:Brown with On Demand.
Speaker C:Coming up, Nielsen's John Miller shares something that could help your ratings tomorrow, and it might be hiding in plain sight.
Speaker F:Yeah, we have a lot going on, multiple stations and formats.
Speaker F:We really need to bundle them all.
Speaker F:Yeah, that sounds really good.
Speaker B:Who are you talking to?
Speaker F:Yeah, I'd like that.
Speaker F:It's Dave from Music Master.
Speaker B:Dave from Music Master at two in the morning?
Speaker B:Who is this?
Speaker F:I told you, it's Dave from Music Master.
Speaker B:Dave from Music Master, huh?
Speaker B:What are you wearing?
Speaker F:Huh?
Speaker F:Khakis from the industry's best music scheduling software, Nexus integration, client server, and yes, 247 support.
Speaker F:Just like your favorite neighbor, Music Master.
Speaker F:Is there details@musicmaster.com opportunities hidden in plain sight.
Speaker A:Plain Sight.
Speaker C:With On Demand, we're with Nielsen's John Miller.
Speaker C:John, what's the one opportunity for radio stations that you feel may be hiding in plain sight?
Speaker A:That's a great question.
Speaker A:I might default to something I said earlier, which is the local nature of what radio does, because that is truly.
Speaker A:That is truly how radio stands out.
Speaker A:Sure, there might be better algorithms out there on Spotify or other places, and sure, podcasts are amazing and give you access to things you can't get anywhere else.
Speaker A:But the local nature of radio, the local community, the ability to connect with people in the community and serve them in addition to the music, that I think is the key.
Speaker A:And I think as long as radio keeps that in its sights and doesn't get too far away from that kind of local edict, I think radio will be just fine, because that's what is the lifeblood of radio, despite all the other things that are out there.
Speaker A:That's why radio is still commanding such a huge share of people's time, because we can get the music anywhere, but we also want that local connection.
Speaker A:So I think that's really the key.
Speaker C:John Miller hey, we've got links to all kinds of great stuff from John and others.
Speaker C:Ed Nielsen there's more all in the show notes.
Speaker C:Just scroll down on your phone.
Speaker D:So if you if you're new to.
Speaker E:The podcast, well, that's really great too.
Speaker E:Awesome.
Speaker E:Just don't forget to smash the follow button on your favorite podcast app.
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Speaker E:We're available wherever better podcasts are found.
Speaker E:And with over 200 episodes, we're here to help you master the art of audio like a pro.
Speaker E:And coming up next, think your show's.
Speaker G:Good enough as is Cool.
Speaker G:But do you want real growth, more listeners, better engagement, the whole deal.
Speaker G:Hi, I'm Hannah B.
Speaker G:And Todd Webster gets it.
Speaker G:He's the mind behind sound profitable.
Speaker G:Helps Spotify, SiriusXM and NPR level up.
Speaker G:And his new book, the Audience is Listening breaks it all down.
Speaker G:Why trust is the secret sauce and how to actually earn it.
Speaker G:That's next time.
Speaker C:That's a wrap.
Speaker C:Kipper.
Speaker C:As is often said, readers are leaders.
Speaker C:We've got something you should be reading.
Speaker C:Oh, you'll find it in one minute.
Speaker C:Martinizing.
Speaker C:It's in the show notes@brandwithondemand.com I'm Dave Martin.
Speaker D:And I'm Kipper McGee.
Speaker E:May all your brand with be wide.
