Podcast Measurement Best Practices with Larry Gerbrandt from Nielsen

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I had the good fortune to sit down one-on-one with General Manager and Senior VP of Nielsen Analytics Larry Gerbrandt and talk about measuring podcasts against other media forms, the behavior of podcast users, and where podcast measurement is heading.

This is a recording of our conversation, which is really insightful if you're working on coming up with ad pricing for your podcast or strategy for how to market your podcast.

Larry Gerbrandt is General Manager and Senior Vice President of Nielsen Analytics.  Larry is responsible for developing leading edge research, analyses and valuation services to companies in the media and entertainment space.

In addition to original research on emerging technologies, Nielsen Analytics conducts primary consumer-level research and synthesizes top level research from the many VNU divisions, including Nielsen Entertainment, Nielsen Media Research, Claritas, SRDS and Scarborough.

Larry's focus is on the convergence of content delivery and consumer media technology and the underlying economic models in the television, motion picture, cable, satellite, music, home video, video game and mobile entertainment.

Prior to joining Nielsen, Larry served in various analytical, editorial and management roles during his twenty year tenure at Kagan World Media, most recently as Chief Operating Officer and also led the media & entertainment practice at AlixPartners LLC.

Larry has authored numerous newsletters and special reports, and is a regular speaker at industry conferences including CTAM, NATPE, NCTA, BCFM, CES, NAB, MIP and MIPCOM.

SHOW NOTES:

5:42 – Gerbrandt discusses the recent Nielsen Analytics report, The Economics of Podcasting.

7:40 – Gerbrandt on measuring podcasts against other forms of media.

9:29 – Gerbrandt, while speaking about the issue of geographic exclusivity affecting measurement, “Podcasting is free…in terms of competing for ears and eyes, it's probably some combination of the web and radio that podcasting really competes with.”

11:05 – Gerbrandt talks about Nielsen's testing methodology and facility.

14:19 – Gerbrandt discusses ensuring the accuracy of a questionnaire. 

18:04 – Gerbrandt offers his thoughts on whether podcasting has a more lucrative future as advertiser supported or advertiser generated.

20:28 – Gerbrandt talks about the difference between consumer expectations online versus television.

22:30 – Gerbrandt talks about the behavior of the 6% of web users that Nielsen reports downloaded podcasts. 

25:33 – Gerbrandt discusses Nielsen's data collection methods and its clients.

28:53 – Gerbrandt on how Nielsen plans to collect podcast listener behavior, “We will be able to determine exactly what was listened to and what was used and for how long.”

29:31 – Gerbrandt talks about the data Nielsen will be collecting on podcasting.

30:51 – Gerbrandt on the metrics advertisers need to know in order to make purchasing decisions.

35:19 – Gerbrandt discusses the premium audience of podcasts, “Podcasts have grown up based on a lot of people's passions and enthusiasms.”

37:32 – Gerbrandt talks about the popularity of CBS versus MTV, and the different goals of broadcast networks versus cable networks. 

40:07 – Gerbrandt discusses how Nielsen is evolving in response to the growth of consumer generated media and new media.

44:43 – End.

Photo by Casey Fiesler