The project got underway almost four years ago. Nielsen was selected as a partner in 2019. But the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 meant the launch of the project was delayed.

“Saudi is the biggest market in the region, and we don’t have a scientific approach (to measuring TV and video data in the Kingdom),” MRC CEO Bandar Al-Mashhadi told Arab News.

The TAM system will collect data from an audience of 2,000 households, chosen to represent as wide a selection of the population as possible. The data aims to paint a precise picture of the size and demographics of TV audiences and how they engage with content.

As the Gulf’s largest market, Saudi attracts the highest marketing budgets and ad spends in the region, making it particularly lucrative for those advertisers who best understand their audiences in the Kingdom.

“We have noticed that the whole industry — broadcasters, advertisers, and agencies — have all reached the conclusion that it is significantly important to move forward with a solution that is based on a scientific approach rather than assumptions, or interviews and surveys,” said Al-Mashhadi. “And I think this is one of the times that everybody is really pushing forward to make this happen.”

MRC selected Nielsen as its partner for the people-meter project as the US data and analytics consultancy has significant experience — it measures TV audiences in more than 40 markets around the world, which is more than any other TAM provider.

“They (Nielsen) have also been working in the region, so they understand the culture, hierarchies, and the ecosystem,” Al-Mashadi added.

“If you look to any developed market or region around the world, audience measurement systems are very well established,” Sarah Messer, the managing director of Nielsen Media MENAP, told Arab News.

“They’re run by an industry committee and adopted by the whole industry and therefore adhere to certain measures and rules. And that’s what we would call (the) gold standard,” she added.

TAM has two main objectives: To help broadcasters understand how viewers consume their content and to offer advertisers insights into their target audiences.

Al-Mashhadi says TAM will help broadcasters make the distinction between good and bad content “based on viewership,” and will also mean that “advertisers can understand how they can reach their … target segment based on the ad itself.”

MRC is currently offering annual subscriptions to clients, who will have access to the latest overnight data by 10 a.m. the following morning, according to Al-Mashhadi.

MRC’s current mandate is to implement the solution in Saudi only “given that it is the biggest market,” Al-Mashhadi said, but it is “more than happy to venture into the GCC area or even Egypt” in future, depending on demand.

MRC will hold a launch event in Saudi Arabia this month for the project. Al-Mashhadi said that MRC is aligning itself with Saudi Vision 2030 by “bringing the sourcing of data in a scientific way back into Saudi.”