Nielsen is about to start measuring mobile ratings, but don't expect a sudden jump in your favorite show's numbers.
The ratings service explained its mobile measurement plans to the Television Critics Association Tuesday, and the upshot is that while people may eventually notice an uptick in ratings, it won't happen right away.
Nielsen exec Cheryl Idell says there will be a test period roughly from September to November while Nielsen works out its "software meters" -- the online version of people meters for traditional TV ratings. It will also share the data with its clients, aka the TV networks, to see if they're comfortable with it.
Once the kinks are worked out, mobile views will be rolled into the ratings numbers you see every day -- provided that mobile viewing carried the same ad load as the on-air broadcast. Nielsen is also measuring streams with "dynamic" ads -- the ones targeted to different viewers -- but those will be counted separately.
A couple other interesting bits from the session:
- Live TV viewing hasn't really changed over the past couple years -- it's steady at 5 hours, 10 minutes per day. Just about everything else, though, from DVR viewing to smartphone and tablet use, has increased.
- The biggest watchers of time-shifted TV are people ages 50-64, with an average of 4 hours, 17 minutes per week. On the flip side, people 18-24 are by far the biggest consumers of video on the Internet (presumably on a PC) at 2:28 per week.
- Smartphone video lags way behind Internet video. Adults watch an average of just nine minutes of video a week on their phones.
