What is the Nielson ratings system?

Question

I'm a British Student and have no idea how the system works and what a good number is.

Answer 1

When TV viewers or entertainment professionals in the United States mention "ratings" they are generally referring to Nielsen Ratings, a system developed by Nielsen Media Research to determine the audience size and composition of television programming. Nielsen Ratings are offered in over forty countries.

Nielsen Television Ratings are reported by ranking the percentage for each show of all viewers watching television at a given time. As of 2005, there are an estimated 110.2 million television households in the USA. A single national ratings point represents 1%, or 1,102,000 households for the 2005-06 season. Share is the percentage of television sets in use tuned to a specific program. These numbers are usually reported as (ratings points/share). For example, Nielsen may report a show as receiving a 9.2/15 during its broadcast, meaning 9.2%, or 10,138,400 households on average were tuned in at any given moment. Additionally, 15% of all televisions in use at the time were tuned into this program. Nielsen re-estimates the number of households each August for the upcoming television season.

Nielsen Media Research also provides statistics on estimated total number of viewers, and on specific demographics. Advertising rates are influenced not only by the total number of viewers, but also by particular demographics, such as age, sex, economic class, and area. Younger viewers are considered more attractive for many products, whereas in some cases older and wealthier audiences are desired, or female audiences are desired over males. Television ratings are not an exact science, but they are a powerful force in determining the programming in an industry where millions of dollars are at stake every day.

Because ratings are based on samples, it is possible for shows to get 0.0 rating, despite having an audience; CNBC talk show McEnroe was one notable example.[3]


Not sure what a good rating is. I guess 15/15 is pretty good but then you'd need the whole United States to watch one show. That won't happen.

Answer 2

When TV viewers or entertainment professionals in the United States mention "ratings" they are generally referring to Nielsen Ratings, a system developed by Nielsen Media Research to determine the audience size and composition of television programming. Nielsen Ratings are offered in over forty countries.

all the information you need is here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nielsen_Ratings

Answer 3

A system developed by Nielsen Media Research to determine the audience size and composition of television programming.