The following was published by Arkansas Business on Feb 5, 2018
Nielsen, Meet Sorenson: TV Ratings Tools Grow
By Kyle Massey
Nielsen is a fabled name in television ratings history, but in smaller markets like Arkansas, it has long been the technological equivalent of a handwritten letter in the Snapchat age.
Participating households fill out a diary of their viewing habits during ratings periods and mail in their responses.
With newer, more advanced rating tools, KATV News Director Nick Genty can punch up details of what Arkansans are watching second by second, with a level of detail that amazes TV veterans.
His new tools, comScore and Sorenson, are technology-based analytics that offer Little Rock's ABC affiliate much faster results and far wider statistical samples.
Sorenson, a ratings metric that's actually built into smart TVs, gives Genty and his colleagues at the Sinclair-owned station a granular view of their audience in near real time, and a glimpse of their competitors' viewership.
Nielsen in this market is still handwritten, and after the ratings period closes, I have to wait three weeks to get any results, Genty said. And we get like an 8 percent return rate to make programming decisions on. In smaller counties, or even targeted counties, you might get six or 10 books back. So you're making decisions based on 10 people who hand-wrote out what they watched on TV.
Among KATV's competitors, KARK dropped the Nielsen service altogether several years ago; KTHV is still a subscriber. Other TV stations around the country have abandoned Nielsen in recent years, and it's no longer the ratings bible it became after initiating TV analytics in 1950, when Texaco Star Theater on NBC was the most-watched show on the 10 million TV sets in use at that time.
Nielsen reigned for decades, as No. 1 shows like Gunsmoke (1960), Laugh-In (1970), Dallas (1980), Roseanne (1990) and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (2000) ruled the airwaves.
In 2018, however, Nielsen's small-market methods seem increasingly antiquated compared with comScore and Sorenson Media, which collects anonymized data from millions of smart TVs under a deal with Inscape, a subsidiary of the privately held TV maker Vizio. Sinclair is still part of the Nielsen family, but with comScore we have about 120,000 connected homes in the market that provide data largely gathered from satellite dish services and multichannel video programming distributors, said General Manager Mark Rose. We get reliable data about a week later, and two weeks later, the reliability is really strong. How strong? Strong enough to be sellable to advertisers, Genty said.
Sorenson, which had enlisted more than 80 U.S. stations by October 2017, lets Genty and Rose know exactly when viewers tune in and where they're coming from, as well as when they leave and what programming drew them away. You can go second by second, which is kind of daunting, Genty said.
Rose said he can't compare costs among Nielsen, comScore and Sorenson because Sinclair negotiates for the entire group. But KATV is sold on the system, which it has used extensively for about a year. We can show a screen of our newscast and a chart of the Sorenson numbers side by side with a competitor, Rose said. We overlay the data with comScore and Nielsen's market research, and we can look across the street at the reactions our competitors are getting, what's resonating with their viewers, and how the audience is reacting to content. Research is never 100 percent certain, but we can track the numbers and find continuity.
Sorenson's potential in targeted advertising is also immense, Rose said. They continue to expand in this smart television world, and soon broadcasters and marketers will be able to offer advertising with addressable content. So if you're watching the news in Little Rock and your brother is watching in Conway, he may see a Caldwell Toyota spot in Conway while you'll have a Crain Automotive ad running in the same commercial break. From a news standpoint, things like tornado warnings and Amber alerts could be directed at just certain areas, allowing people elsewhere to keep watching their regular programming.
The numbers also help Genty in coaching reporters. If they're telling me they need five minutes to tell a story, I can show them how viewership falls after a couple of minutes, he said.
By any measure, the KATV news team loves ratings, not least because they lead the pack. At 6 a.m., according to November's numbers, KATV's Daybreak had a 22.7 percent share, compared with 17.57 for KTHV and 13.36 for KARK. At 6 p.m., Channel 7's newscast had a 21.1 share to 11.92 for KARK and 10.11 for KTHV.
Those numbers, by the way, are from comScore. KATV stopped citing Nielsen in its news releases in mid-2017.
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
07/10/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, today announced the latest Long-Term Supported (LTS) release of Dalet Flex. Build...
08/09/2026
Comcast Technology Solutions (CTS) has announced a multi-year agreement with A E...
08/09/2026
Spectra Logic today announced the availability of Media Insight, a new capabilit...
08/09/2026
Rogers Communications and Quebecor have announced a 12-year sublicensing agreement for French-language national NHL games beginning with the 2026-27 season. TVA...
08/09/2026
Skyline Communications and Bridge Technologies will demonstrate two integrations...
08/09/2026
Boland Communications will make the European debut of its 4K55HDR7SNB 55-inch super-narrow-bezel monitor at IBC2026 (Stand 12.C57, RAI Amsterdam, September 11-1...
08/09/2026
Ateme and Comcast Technology Solutions (CTS) have announced a collaboration comb...
08/09/2026
Haivision has joined the IBC Accelerator Media Innovation Programme as part of t...
08/09/2026
Blackmagic Design has announced price reductions on its PYXIS 6K and Cinema Camera 6K models, effective immediately through Blackmagic Design resellers worldwid...
08/09/2026
AI-Media will demonstrate its LEXI Suite at IBC2026 (Booth 5.C34, September 11-1...
08/09/2026
Bitmovin and Ad Insertion Platform (AIP) have announced the first live deploymen...
08/09/2026
Grass Valley will demonstrate story-centric media workflows at IBC2026 (Booth 9.A01, RAI Amsterdam, September 11-14), connecting newsroom production, content ma...
08/09/2026
M2A Media and Ateme have announced a partnership integrating Ateme's video processing solutions into M2A Media's MediaToAnywhere platform for live sport...
08/09/2026
Ikegami will exhibit at IBC2026 (Stand 12.A31, RAI Amsterdam, September 11-14), including a Day 1 introduction of new cameras in the UNICAM XE series. Additiona...
08/09/2026
Broadcast industry analysts will be gathering plenty of insights at the 2026 IBC Show this weekend in Amsterdam, but Caretta Research has offered up some though...
08/09/2026
SENSHI and DAZN have announced a global broadcast partnership that will bring SENSHI's live events free to viewers in more than 200 markets. The partnership...
08/09/2026
New architecture built with Evertz will bring 4K HDR to Monday Night Football, N...
08/09/2026
Built for rap producers, by rap producers
Sauceware Audio, the independent plug-in company founded by Grammy-nominated producer Jacob (Travis Scott, 21 Sava...
08/09/2026
Classic Sound Techniques design revived
Warm Audio's latest release delivers a meticulous recreation of the preamp circuitry employed by the Sound Techn...
08/09/2026
Latest soft synth inspired by the Memorymoog
XILS Lab have just launched a software instrument that draws its inspiration from Moog's iconic Memorymoog,...
08/09/2026
The Airport Chaplain takes off as SBS's biggest launch of 2026
8 September, 2026
Media releases
1.67 million viewers on National Total TV to date
Best...
08/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/09/2026
Mo-Sys, the world-leading developer of virtual production, camera robotics and image tracking technology, has completed a business restructuring, which has incl...
08/09/2026
New York, September 8, 2026 The TSAmediaHUB audiovisual contribution and distribution infrastructure developed by Telef nica's Audiovisual Services area re...
08/09/2026
Expanded Riyadh operation brings Asharq and Thmanyah services together on a resilient on-premises Pebble platform.
Pebble, the leading automation, content mana...
08/09/2026
Techex, a pioneering leader in live video workflows, will showcase its broadest software feature set to date at IBC 2026 (Stand 2.B45), extending its lead in so...
08/09/2026
Visitors to Grass Valley's booth at IBC2026 will be introduced to new Framelight X capabilities that connect content acquisition, management, editing and pu...
08/09/2026
BCNEXXT will showcase the latest evolution of Vipe at IBC2026 (Stand 2.B09), introducing a series of innovations designed to deliver higher-quality audience exp...
08/09/2026
Bitmovin, a provider of video streaming solutions, has partnered with Ad Insertion Platform (AIP), a leading innovator in advanced ad insertion technologies, to...
08/09/2026
Brainstorm, a leading manufacturer of real-time graphics and augmented and virtual production, is announcing a major package of enhancements to its Suite 7 soft...
08/09/2026
Big Blue Marble is supporting TDF, French infrastructure and network operator, broadcasting Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) and radio services, as a techno...
08/09/2026
Agents work inside a single production environment, from incoming wire copy to a live studio show...
08/09/2026
Building on their strategic partnership, Ceeblue and Layercake make the unthinkable possible: scalable sub-second streaming over standard DRM, SSAI, and CDN wor...
08/09/2026
Brainstorm, a leading manufacturer of real-time graphics, augmented and virtual production, is completing the environment for fast-paced broadcast production wi...
08/09/2026
A SaaS portfolio built to work together, helping operators grow audiences, monetise smarter and run leaner, on their own terms
At IBC 2026 (stand 1.B49) Synam...
08/09/2026
Accedo, global provider of video streaming software and services, has been selected by PlayOn Sports, a national leader in high school sports technology, to exp...
08/09/2026
LiveU, the leader in live IP-video solutions, is enabling The Associated Press to take global newsgathering to the next stage with intelligent connectivity and ...
08/09/2026
Mediagenix, a global leader in smart content solutions to profitably connect the right content to the right audience, today announced the latest evolution of it...
08/09/2026
Compact, power-efficient X Platform performance brings broadcast-grade reliability and ultra-low latency to space-constrained remote production (REMI) workflows...
08/09/2026
Zixi, the leader in live video delivery and workflow orchestration, and Kiloview, a leading provider of professional IP video encoding and decoding solutions, t...
08/09/2026
Collaboration gives content owners scalable CDN capacity and broadcasters enhanced flexibility, including for C-band transition planning
Quortex today announce...
08/09/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
08/09/2026
Telos Alliance and Pluxbox Announce Dynamic Media Facility Integration Partnersh...
08/09/2026
J nger Audio Showcases Industry-First S-ADM Cloud Workflow at IBC 2026
Search
Dolby, MainConcept, Techex and J nger Audio will showcase the industry's ...
08/09/2026
Tuesday 8 September 2026
Sky Go gets a major upgrade for Sky Glass and Sky Stream customers
Today, Sky launches a new version of the Sky Go app for Sky Glass ...
08/09/2026
Documentary thriller simulating a Russian attack on UK soil will culminate in a live final episode reuniting the playersTuesday 8 September 2026
Trailer releas...
08/09/2026
Tuesday 8 September 2026
Jamie Demetriou and Amelia Dimoldenberg to host next t...
08/09/2026
Wuppertal September 8, 2026
Riedel Introduces New OnAir Headset PlatformRiedel Communications today announced the launch of its new OnAir headset platform, a...
The following was published by Arkansas Business on Feb 5, 2018
