Horizon Media Plans to Test Comscore to Measure Local TV Audiences

variety.com:

Brian Steinberg Senior TV EditorIndependent media-buying operation Horizon Media plans to test a local-TV audience measurement technology from Comscore, the latest big advertising or media entity to enlist a Nielsen rival for the purpose of counting TV viewers.Horizon plans to examine Comscore’s local TV solution to see if it could serve as a new benchmark for advertising transactions in 2023.

Horizon in April said that it intended to commit “up to 15% of its deals” in the industry’s  upfront market to be based on new measurement currencies that don’t rely on the sector’s longtime tabulator of audiences, Nielsen.

Horizon issued a request for information to various media companies in the fourth quarter of 2021, and said at the time that it expected to work “with media entities including Paramount, NBCUniversal, Warner Bros.

Discovery, AMC Networks, as well as Allen Media Group and several other minority-owned and targeted companies, on collective solutions.” The media buyer, which works for clients including Berkshire Hathaway’s Geico and Anheuser-Busch InBev’s Corona, to conduct its assessment in two different phases.