New Ad Ratings Roil Market

A new ad ratings program has changed the TV ad buying market. “Advertisers paid extra to have ad buys based on the new ratings service. They did so on the broadcast side and would do so on the cable side if the currency is adopted there as well, sellers said. Audiences for ads in prime time are about 5 percent smaller on average across the major broadcast networks than the audiences for the programs, according to Nielsen Media Research.”