PPM in Houston Receives MRC Accreditation

Arbitron - and perhaps the radio industry as a whole - has reached a milestone today, as the PPM has achieved Media Rating Council accreditation for its data in Houston.

Now that MRC accreditation has been granted for the Houston PPM radio ratings data, Arbitron will meet with radio broadcasters, agencies and advertisers to determine the most appropriate schedule for commercializing the electronic radio ratings service in Houston, according to Arbitron.

In March 2006, at the request of the Arbitron Radio Advisory Council, Arbitron agreed to wait until it received MRC accreditation for the PPM radio ratings service in Houston - the PPM’s first market - before it would discontinue the diaries and make the PPM the currency for radio ratings in Houston.
In the other markets in which the PPM is rolling out, such as Philadelphia and New York, Arbitron will not wait for MRC accreditation before it launches commercially. However, the MRC will have completed an audit and a report on those markets before Arbitron rolls them out (Philadelphia in March and New York in December).

The Arbitron Radio Advisory Council felt that, with Houston being its first city to use PPM, Arbitron should “prove” to the industry that the PPM was capable of being accredited. Arbitron agreed that it would not use the PPM as currency in Houston until it had achieved accreditation. Future audits should happen at a quicker pace because the MRC has already completed an audit of how the PPM works.

The announcement is a big deal for the radio industry, in that there has never been an accredited personal, portable electronic meter system for measuring radio.

Arbitron is currently conducting a Winter 2007 survey in Houston using its standard diary methodology. Arbitron intends to complete that diary survey and deliver a full suite of ratings reports for the Winter 2007 survey in April.

“This is the first completely new, electronic methodology for broadcast ratings since the set-top, push-button people meter was introduced in the late 1980s. It’s the only personal, portable electronic meter system in the world that’s ever been subjected to an MRC audit and has met the accreditation standards of the Media Rating Council for a radio ratings service,” says Steve Morris, president and chief executive officer, Arbitron Inc.

Arbitron is also pursuing MRC accreditation for the broadcast television and cable television data in Houston that utilize the same PPM technology and respondents as the radio ratings data.