VIEWPOINTS : TV ‘People Meter’ Needn’t Bring On Anxiety Attack

Once upon a time, there were just three television networks and life was simple. Today, ABC, CBS and NBC are fighting hard to retain their leadership in light of new technology and a massive change in viewer habits.

The boom in independent television stations, cable and subscription TV service and videocassette recorders has eroded the network audience over the past decade; the share of home television viewing snared by the Big Three networks has shrunk from 90% to around 73%.

As if that isn’t aggravation enough for the Big Three, now comes along the “people meter,” a revolutionary audience-measuring device. Audience estimates--better known as “the ratings,” gathered by such research organizations as A. C. Nielsen--always have been lambasted by networks and producers with low rankings. But Nielsen’s new people meter, which went into official operation Sept. 1, is helping network executives discover new frontiers in angst .

So far, the people meter is showing a continued decline in network viewing, and if that continues, their bottom lines will suffer further. CBS executives have charged that the three major networks already have lost $40 million to $50 million in advertising revenue because of errors in the system.

In a letter disclosed last month, CBS Broadcast Group President Gene F. Jankowski argued that the homes equipped with Nielsen’s viewer-operated people meter were not “representative of the U.S. viewing population.” Other network executives have offered similar complaints.

Unfortunately, in their hurry to depict the people meter as a villain, network executives are overlooking the potential the new technology has to improve the way television serves viewers and advertisers.

Will Monitor More Homes

To understand why, here’s some background: People meters are a major advance in television research. The electronic, hand-held device indicates how many people in a home are watching TV as well as their age and gender. Beyond that, the people meter reports when a viewer leaves the room as well as when a viewer abandons broadcast television for cable or a videocassette. This sort of demographic data and apparent audience-measuring precision never was available before.

Advertisers adore this information, because it tells them what kind of audience they are reaching and whether they are paying a fair price for their commercials. For the networks, millions of dollars ride on a fraction of a rating point.

There are slightly more than 2,000 people meters in selected television households across the country. But, by the end of the year, between Nielsen and AGB Television Research, 9,000 television homes will have their viewing habits bugged with people meters.

For all their technological sophistication, people meters work only if the folks at home program the meters with accurate information about who is watching and for how long. Somebody has to punch those buttons. There’s the rub. David Poltrack, vice president of CBS Television research, says that already has proven to be a problem and will become a worse one when viewers tire of dealing with the devices.

Curt Block, vice president for media at NBC, questions how well young audiences will work the buttons. Will the precious children’s audience register their viewing accurately enough to reflect a true sample for a Kellogg’s or a Mattel?

Sample Is ‘Representative’

Nielsen assures its broadcasting and advertising customers that its sample is representative and that more than half of the homes approached for installation of people meters take them enthusiastically. The company claims that 87% of its sample audience is reporting its viewing accurately, far better than the old system, in which viewers filled out “diaries” to indicate what they saw.

AGB claims that its meters soon will even identify what shows the viewers are watching on pay or cable television or VCRs, another major advance over the diary system.

With VCRs and cable and pay television now penetrating more than 50% of U.S. households, with direct broadcast satellite services around the corner and with people meters eventually going into 100 markets, the Big Three have a big problem. Their only hope, in the near term, is to challenge the veracity of the people meters.

Advertising agencies, on the other hand, armed with tons of new data, will contest what they believe are inflated rates for commercial time. In the end, no matter what version of people meter measuring wins out in the future, advertising agencies will insist on the best that technology can offer.

What may result from all this maneuvering is a broad spectrum of television entertainment and information that will ultimately benefit the viewer. The highly defined data of audience preferences will encourage advertisers to seek out precisely targeted viewers for their products and services.

The networks necessarily have been “shotgun” mediums loosely aimed at the mass audience. Now, both program producers and advertisers can pinpoint their creative and commercial efforts. Consequently, the focus eventually will be on efficiency and effective reach more than on frequency.

Let’s just imagine that people meters reveal that 25 million viewers have a taste for ballet. Certainly that would be an attractive market for advertisers and an opportunity for creative programming. The same could be said of swap meets or cartoons.

Other Aces Still Held

People meters were inevitable for a nation of consumers pursued by a mercantile medium. The outcome should provide us, the viewers, with a much wider array of programming options rather than the duplication of well-worn formats. The idea of a mass audience will yield to the articulated audience. Even so, the network system will prevail because a network is the only medium able to provide advertisers with national audience for their specific message all at once.

And the Big Three still hold some other aces in their hands. They have powerful institutional images. They provide a national organ for news gathering and dissemination. They still have the allegiance of a large majority of viewers. They may have to settle for a smaller piece of the pie, but it is still within their means to lead the way by innovation and enterprise. They may discover new audiences while fine-tuning their programming. If so, people meters will turn out to be a blessing for the networks as well as the advertisers and viewers.