Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Want to Save CHUCK? Help Nielsen Families Help You

CHUCK needs ratings to survive.  The only way to contribute to the ratings is to be a Nielsen Family member.  But that isn't enough.  See, a lot of Nielsen Family members don't know how the system works.  They think they are helping CHUCK but then do something to have their views either not counted or not fully counted.  So, here is the CHUCK FANDOM MISSION, get the message out to Nielsen Families who love CHUCK, read this blog posting:

WATCH CHUCK LIVE (IMPORTANT: do not change channels during commercials)

If you must DVR an episode, be sure to watch the episode prior to 3AM that day and DO NOT skip any commercials. You must watch your DVR recording as if it were live. You can actually watch the recording within 3-days and have it count but for it to be counted in overnight ratings, watch it prior to 3AM. 

Watching LIVE is most important, so let me detail for you how to get the maximum result from that while using your Nielsen meter.

You should have a button for each member in your house as well as buttons for guests.
  • Push EVERY BUTTON when they flash
  • Make sure to report ages of any guest watching between 18-49 years (18-34 is even better).
  • If you don't have a button but wear a passive meter then just adhere to the next point
  • DO NOT change channels during commercials!
    • I cannot stress this enough.  Your ratings will not count if you do.

Have more TVs? You can have Nielsen add boxes to those and push your buttons like crazy.  Some people don't like to add boxes to TVs because Nielsen physically opens your devices to apply these meters to them, but if you want CHUCK to live on, I highly recommend doing it.

By the way, the most common Nielsen Family viewing recording tool is a diary. You write down what you watched and send it in to Nielsen. Make sure everyone in your household sends in that they watched CHUCK live and that you had lots of people there with you when you watched (full room... you hold parties every Monday).  While this won't be counted in the overnights, it will help CHUCK in the long run.

WHAT IS NIELSEN?

27 comments:

  1. Wow. In Canada it's a whole lot easier. We just wear meters that pick up what we're watching. They're like a walking meter than remain active as long as there's movement every now and then.
    In our house 4 people were watching Chuck last night and we made sure not to flip the channel during commercials.

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  2. They have them in the US too but I don't really need to tell those people to push buttons. HOWEVER, the same theory applies, DO NOT switch channels during the commercials.

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  3. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't anonymity a condition of being a "Nielsen family"? that would make "getting the message out" quite a bit harder. =D

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  4. So you think Nielsen families don't know they are Nielsen members?

    See, by spreading the word, it will get to them. Is this really that complicated?

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  5. So all you gotta do is watch it live & do not switch channels during commercials right? What do you mean by "Push every button when they flash" ?

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  6. Some Nielsen viewers get buttons that flash while they are watching a show. They push the button to indicate they are actively watching.

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  7. How do I possibly get one? A Nielsen control or some sort

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  8. Anonymous, if that even is your name, you don't "get" one. They find you and give you one. I am not asking people to find Nielsen viewers or to become Nielsen viewers. Just keep spreading the message of this blog (or just link to it) as often as you can... statistically, we are bound to reach a few Nielsen viewers who will help and make a difference.

    But we all have to contribute.

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  9. if viewers from asia were counted in the ratings, probably wb would've renewed chuch season 5 already.

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  10. I really love the accompanying picture Magnus...did you do it??

    As always, thanks for reiterating the Nielsen point...Hopefully letting a few more people know about how to spread the word will be enough to help not give us Chuck fans acid reflux again this year ;)

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  11. I did not make that, no. It was a submission to the WHC poster contest... and should have been the winner.

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  12. Next episode is the one where a naked women holds a gun to Chuck's head hopefully that will get male veiwership up I think males are the target audience of Chuck males 18 to 49

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  13. This is just an idea. Why doesn't someone make a video about this on youtube and leave the link here and then people can spread the word that way.

    what do you think Magnus?

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  14. I just looked at the ratings for Wed Night and was surprised that Undercovers got the same rating as Chuck. What bothered me is NBC advertised the heck out of Undercovers and almost nothing for Chuck. To make it worse it was still the lamest night of television. I would like your take on why undercovers did not meet ratings expectations, why Chuck exceded your ratings expectations, and how this effects the back 6/9.

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  15. Magnus,
    there is this site http://www.rewardtv.com/welcome/sampleGames.sdo Nielsen runs it as well, (I was told) where you tell them the show you watched the previous night, then they quiz you about the show and the commercials in it.
    My question is, Is this site legit? If it is, do they help the show at all? as far as the actual ratings are concerned.

    Chris

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  16. here in Brazil we don't have nbc channel, but we may watch Chuck in warner channel, but is on the 3rd season yet, anyway i watch it live, i hope that helps in something, cause i'm a big fan of Chuck and i don't know how my life will be without Chuck, probably will be a suck!

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  17. Diane says...

    RewardTV is legit. It's owned by Nielsen and the results are sold to advertisers as "engagement" research that tells them which shows have the most engaged viewers. The theory is that the more engaged the viewer the more likely they remember the ads.

    The score is based on how many of the questions you get correct, though. So, don't play it if you get the questions wrong.

    It has no impact on the ratings that measure how many viewers the show has, though.

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  18. Good point... if you are not prepared to answer correctly, don't play! :)

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  19. I can't watch Chuck any other way but to download it. So, my watches won't count anyway... D:

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  20. Don't forget about Arbitron...Nielsen's biggest competitor in the ratings business!

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  21. Diane, Thanks for clearing that up..I only get like 1 or 2 wrong in the commercials. I get the name brands right but somehow I managed to get the mottos wrong.
    Sorry if I'm off topic

    Chris

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  22. the chances of one of us actually knowing a Nielson family is very slim. why bother

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  23. By simply retweeting and linking to this posting, we increase the chance that SOMEONE who is a Nielsen member will not only read this but act on it. We have already found 9 Nielsen Family members this way and three BRAND NEW Nielsen members via this method.

    And those are just the ones who have contacted me. So, while we may not ever know anyone in our personal lives who is a Nielsen family member, the chance of us running across a few on the INTERNET is good.

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No flaming, baiting, trolling, expletives, or racism allowed. And NO DISCUSSIONS of the actor's personal lives ever.