Is TAM India’s return to ratings business the end of the road for BARC India?

New Delhi: If the top industry voices are to be believed, India may soon have two parallel currencies in television audience measurement as TAM India signals its readiness to return to the rating business with a multiscreen measurement.

The government proposed last week to remove entry barriers for individual companies to enter into the measurement business, opening doors for more and more companies to invest in the multiple ratings era.

As per the 2014 guidelines, TAM India was technically always eligible for registration as a measurement company and had been in talks with the I&B ministry.

However, the firm had to stay away from the linear television ratings business, owing to its 49% ownership of Meteorology Data Pvt Ltd (MDPL), a joint venture with BARC India to manage its people meters.

As a result, TAM India was for a long time exploring ways to measure beyond linear TV and re-enter the audience measurement business after more than a decade.

Even as the impending multiscreen measurement will measure linear TV along with digital videos, it will be done through the return path data (RPD) mechanism instead of the people meters.

The other big barrier was the huge investment required to run a measurement currency in a complex digital environment involving collaborations with multiple partners.

The proposed removal of cross-holding restrictions and allowing individual players to enter the measurement business are expected to address the funding concerns in a significant way.

Multiple stakeholders told BestMediaInfo that if TAM is saying it is testing the waters with multiple partners, it is essentially the advanced stage, and you can expect a formal announcement in the next six to eight months.

Dual or multiple ratings currencies were pushed by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) and the I&B Ministry, as BARC India failed to scale the sample size or expand its offering to cross-device measurement.

However, the Indian advertising industry is divided on the multiple currencies era. While one section of the industry believes this will put pressure on BARC India, the other section sees this as a regressive move.

A senior advertising veteran, citing global trends, told BestMediaInfo.com that the world is moving towards a single measurement currency, whereas India is preparing to have multiple currencies catering to each medium.

India’s fragmented approach to audience measurement has long been a challenge for advertisers and media planners.

TV is measured by BARC, print by IRS and ABC, radio by RAM, and digital platforms each have their own separate metrics. This disconnect leads to duplicated audience counts and overlapping media exposure, often making ad spends less efficient.

The current fragmented system leads to duplicated audience counts, inefficient ad spends, and a limited understanding of consumers across devices and platforms. Many believe this has eroded trust in audience data, especially for digital and regional markets.

Globally, several countries have already begun shifting to unified measurement.

In the Netherlands, a single-source panel now tracks TV, radio, print, digital and mobile audiences, allowing advertisers to plan with de-duplicated data. The UK’s CFlight merges traditional and digital video into a unified metric, while France’s Médiamétrie integrates TV, digital and streaming.

A unified measurement system could deliver similar benefits for India: advertisers could reduce waste, agencies could offer better cross-media planning, and regional media could demonstrate their true audience value.

Transparent, third-party validated data would also help marketers move away from fragmented reporting and walled gardens.

Many broadcast veterans opined that if a single currency offering cross-measurement is the way forward, it will be BARC India whose future will be at stake.