Anyway you slice it, the evidence is clear that Nielsen’s PPM does not capture all listening exposure.
Nielsen’s own research presented at the NAB Radio Show proves it. Case closed.
The only debate now is how to fix it.
Voltair proved that stations could grow AQH by processing their audio in a new way.
Nielsen wants a “level playing field” so they’ve responded by reworking the encoder, in some respects emulating what Voltair does.
The bottom line is that we should see radio listening continue to grow as we’ve documented here and here.
Preliminary data from the Baltimore/DC test saw AQH persons across twelve out of nineteen participating station increase by 15% with Nielsen’s enhanced encoding.
We think the actual impact on total radio listening will be higher than that, but any increase will be welcomed.
Do you still need Voltair?
Based on what we’ve seen, yes. You may want to back off the settings once you update your encoder, but we need to see the impact of the new enhanced encoding on stations not using Voltair to know for sure.
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