New York – Nielsen has announced a pilot programme for Nielsen Digital Program Ratings, which will measure audiences for TV content viewed online. A+E, ABC, AOL, CBS, The CW, Discovery Communications, FOX, NBC and Univision have all signed on to participate in this test, which will begin in May and run through July. The initial focus of the pilot will be measurement of TV content viewed online, with additional content types and devices to be supported in future releases. The pilot program will complete later this summer and will be used to fine-tune Nielsen Digital Programme Ratings prior to commercial launch.

Nielsen Digital Program Ratings leverage the same measurement methodology used in Nielsen Online Campaign Ratings™. The pilot for Nielsen Digital Programme Ratings will provide similar overnight audience data, including unique audience, stream counts and reach by age and gender for TV programming viewed online. The commercial release of Nielsen Digital Programme Ratings is targeted for later this year and will include duration weighting of video and reporting of TV-comparable ratings.

“The pilot for Nielsen Digital Programme Ratings is a major milestone for the industry,” said Eric Solomon, SVP for Global Digital Audience Measurement at Nielsen. “As a companion product to Nielsen Online Campaign Ratings, Nielsen Digital Programme Ratings will enable clients to better understand the online audience for their programming by harnessing the same methodology Nielsen already uses to measure the audience for related advertising.”