New TRP system to start early next year

8 global agencies in race to draw blueprint for BARC's TV audience measurement system.

38 global agencies in race to draw blueprint for BARC's TV audience measurement system

The long wait for another television ratings measurement (TRP) system will end next year. The Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), the audience research measurement body formed jointly by broadcasters, advertisers and advertising agencies, will start its audience measurement by the first quarter of 2014.

While it took much longer than expected, Manjit Singh, president of the Indian Broadcasting Foundation and Chief Executive of Multi Screen media (MSM), says the industry has committed to the Information & Broadcasting Ministry on the rollout of BARC in the first quarter.

"BARC is very much on; it took time because three different bodies - IBF, Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) and the Indian Society of Advertisers (ISA) - were to be brought on the same page. Now we have the agreement, we have formed the board, and have got great response on the global Request for Information (RFI) that we issued."

BARC had issued the RFI in January, seeking ideas, templates and experiences on television audience measurement that will help it to draw up a blueprint for a new TV audience measurement system. Singh said that they received 38 responses from across the globe.

On the vision for BARC, he said the current TV ratings measurement system by TAM had many loopholes and there was a need for a much more robust system.

MSM, he said, was even considering cancelling the subscription of TAM data, as the company didn't want to be measured on an imperfect system.