Is it possible to measure sports audiences anymore?

From the Paris Olympics to the new NBA deal to the upcoming NFL season on Venu Sports, it’s no secret that sports audiences tune in across several platforms in 2024. So while an audience measurement company like Nielsen may appear behind the times, its executives insist their work remains vital to understanding and valuing viewership.

In an interview on T he Sports Media Podcast released Wednesday , Nielsen senior vice president of product strategy Brian Fuhrer defended his company and explained how it is adapting to the modern consumption environment.

“I would say that we’re an easy target, because we’ve been around a while and we try and do the best we can, all of this,” Fuhrer told host Austin Karp of the Sports Business Journal. “But I will say I think we have really good relationships with all our clients and we continue to work with them to maximize their opportunity across all different platforms.”

Nielsen clearly knows that when it makes changes like including out-of-home viewing in its measurements or negotiates with Amazon over including Prime Video broadcasts of Thursday Night Football and the NBA in its ratings, it will be criticized.

Fuhrer said that the advent of Netflix trained viewers to consume libraries of old and new content across any device in any place. That meant Nielsen’s original strategy of tracking home viewership of different television programs no longer told the full story.

“It comes as no surprise that consumers have really adopted the ability to watch content whenever they want,” Fuhrer said. “The infusion of content that Netflix introduced and training consumers to watch these deep libraries of content at any point, that’s been the biggest change … from a behavior standpoint.”

Now, sports fans tune in on multiple platforms at the same time. Olympic viewers could be watching gymnastics on E! or Peacock, not to mention the rebroadcast each night on NBC’s broadcast network. This fall, fans can watch Fox’s NFL “America’s Game of the Week” on its broadcast network or Venu Sports. Soon, ESPN will have a fully direct to consumer digital service in addition to its cable network, ESPN+ and Venu.

“The thing I think that’s really interesting now is how it’s converging across everything,” Fuhrer added. “They’re not dissimilar platforms, content is just existing simultaneously across the traditional broadcast, syndication and streaming at the same time. Putting all that together so that people can really understand where the audiences are and value the content and advertising is really critical.”

[ The Sports Media Podcast ]

The post Nielsen SVP Brian Fuhrer says company is ‘an easy target’ on sports ratings appeared first on Awful Announcing .