How do TV networks know how many people are watching their programs?

Question

How do TV networks know how many people are watching their programs?

Answer 1

most often by the response to exclusive advertising.

Answer 2

they dont know!

like AGB Nielsen research group, they put a small box connected to the tv and these people/family have this device are randomly choose by the research group.

Answer 3

You can get a little box to sit next to your TV that records the programs you are watching. They find out how many people have these, how many people are recorded to be watching the program, and then multiply it by how many people dont have one. E.G if one in ten people had the box they would multiply it by ten.

Answer 4

There are independent research companies who put some monitoring device to impartial panel homes. And then they monitor how much of these homes watch a particular network. The number of panel homes is dependent on the number of the general population, it's a statistics thing.

The TV networks then subscribe to these research companies' findings to know how much of the population watches them. The result is also the basis used by advertisers to decide which station and program to put ads on.

The result is actually called TV ratings, if you ever heard of it.

Answer 5

In the old days they (companies like nielson) used to actually call and poll people.

Later they moved to paper logging, where they would select a family and they would write it down and mail it in.  (These were called Nielson families).

As technology progressed, electronic boxes (hooked to the tv similar to a cable box, then called in their results) were used and replaced the paper logging.

Today these electronic boxes are still used, but only make up part of the numbers.  Numbers also come from digital cable boxes (although deemed highly inaccurate because the cable company can not say definitively that the tv is being watched, only that the cable box was on) and PVR's such as TIVOs (deemed highly accurate but sometimes argued as being biased because they are owned by more white collar and fewer blue collar viewers).

Generally only a small sample of the population is polled (percentage varies by market), and the percentage of viewers watching a particular show is assumed to be accurate for the population of that market as a whole.

For example, in a market of 1 million people, 1000 families may be selected (or 1000 devices polled), and if 300 were watching CSI, then its assumed that 30%, or 300,000 people in that market were watching CSI.