Nielsen, a US-based global information and measurement company, is rolling out a new metric for Facebook that can show you how many people are scrolling through Facebook as they watch TV. Facebook’s new metric is called Social Content Ratings, which is very similar to Twitter TV Ratings that Nielsen launched in 2013. The purpose of Social Content Ratings is to give TV and streaming networks, along with advertisers, a sense of just how many people are engaging with TV content on social media and when.
So far, Nielsen has found that Facebook members are talking about shows during and, surprisingly, after they air. For example, conversations that take place on Facebook for Scandal happened during non-broadcast dates. For networks and advertisers, this means that Scandal’s content and digital ads should be shared on an ongoing basis rather than leading up to the broadcast.
See the statistics shown for ABC’s Scandal below:
Much in the way that Twitter has always framed its identity, Facebook is furthering their strategy to be seen as a crucial extension of live TV. In recent years, Facebook has been working to court TV networks and movie studios to share their content, launch trailers, and run ads on the social platform. Last year, Facebook also launched an ad-buying product that provides Nielsen ratings for digital ads. Now with the introduction of Nielsen’s Social Content Rating, Facebook is getting a strong foothold in blurring the lines between TV and Facebook.
See how Empire performs during commercial breaks
For Nielsen, Social Content Rating is part of its larger, “total audience measurement” initiative that breaks down analytics on TV views across both TV and digital platforms. TV viewing continues to become more fragmented across multiple devices. Now with DVR’s and on-demand option TV viewing is also scattered across time, making Nielsen’s ratings to become antiquated. Good news for networks, Facebook and Nielsen are both working towards improving their statistics accuracy, so that they can keep up with these changing viewing habits. In the meantime, however, who will networks blame for bad statistics and reporting?