How does television stations know how many people watch a show?

Question

There could be multiple people watching one TV, or only one person, or even none. I have 5 TVs in my house. I could turn them all to one channel. Do they know when we turn on a TV?
How do they calculate the ratings? Yes, I know it's more than one question.

I'm Australian.

Answer 1

They have people who have agreed to participate in a panel to give them info. on what people are watching. The Neilsen ratings?? Ever heard of them.

They send these people from all different types of life, scanners or survey equipment. The agreement is that these people will tell them what they are watching.

I do this but for a different industry. I have a scanner from a division of this company. I scan everything that I buy...including groceries, clothes, etc. & tell them the cost, if I got it on sale, etc.

This is how they do ratings for everything & companies buy this service in order to make the best product or fill a need or desire out there in the public area.

Answer 2

Neilson ratings...they send a survey to various households that fill in their viewing status for a week and get the stats from that.

Answer 3

I think that they use the Neilsen ratings which is supposed to represent the majority of the American population.

Answer 4

Neilson ratings.

Answer 5

Nielsen watches and rates shows being viewed.

Answer 6

they watch you there are little boxes in the cable box that updates every thirty minutes on which channel your watching

Answer 7

dude I ask myself the same questions!dunno...if sby tells you let me know dude...