OzTAM's measurement principles

Principle

Evidenced by

Transparency

OzTAM is an independent company whose audience data is underpinned by metrics and methodologies that meet accepted and open industry standards.

• OzTAM’s neutral, unbiased data is independently collected and produced by an external research supplier on OzTAM's behalf.

• OzTAM’s Gold Standard software accreditation system specifies the arithmetical procedures to deliver uniform calculations, as well as standard industry terms and language to use.

• Only Gold Standard accredited software may be used to analyse OzTAM data. 

• The Gold Standard system ensures data users achieve consistent results, regardless of which accredited analysis software they use to calculate OzTAM ratings.

Accountability

OzTAM adheres to rigorous corporate governance principles, and our broadcast TV data is independently audited and validated, and subject to broad industry oversight.

• OzTAM’s robust quality objectives and framework for benchmarking them are constantly reviewed for compliance and suitability.

• Rigorous corporate governance underpins OzTAM’s licences and contracts, which adhere to both the letter and spirit of all relevant regulations, reporting principles and standards.

• OzTAM has an independent, non-executive chairman and upholds formal governance processes.

• The ABC and SBS television networks, Foxtel, Media Federation of Australia (MFA) and Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) have observer status at OzTAM board meetings.

• OzTAM has a Technical Advisory Committee, comprising representatives from across the media industry, which meets regularly to discuss technical issues regarding the performance, development and design of the ratings service, with a focus on continuous improvement.

• OzTAM's combined VOZ and VPM (Video Player Measurement) Product Group, comprising representatives across Australia's television broadcasting industry, meets regularly to discuss the development of the VOZ Total TV measurement service as well as the evolution and accountability of the BVOD measurement service, and its application to the VOZ Total TV database.

Accuracy

OzTAM delivers the clearest picture of the broadcast content Australians are watching, who is watching, the amount of time they spend watching, and how they are watching ('Total TV').

• OzTAM retains an independent technical auditor whose role is to ensure the broadcast TV panels perform to specification.

• OzTAM is Australia’s only measurement service that captures and de-duplicates broadcast viewing on all household TV sets (whether connected or not) plus all broadcast viewing on connected devices (BVOD).

• Uniquely in Australia, OzTAM combines minute-by-minute viewing data, 24/7/365, with census-level online (BVOD) viewing validated by robust, representative person-level data from a large scale, in-home viewer panel. Panels are essential to provide demographics and co-viewing, and recognise the approximately 35% of TV sets in Australian households are not internet-connected.

• Australia is among the world’s largest people metered markets (combined OzTAM and Regional TAM panels) in terms of panel size relative to the overall population.

Continual improvement

OzTAM is constantly innovating to remain at the forefront of audience measurement in Australia and around the world, improving our current services and embracing the latest methodologies and technologies to build new, future-focused measurement capabilities.

• OzTAM consults continually and widely across the industry to ensure our service reflects the changing ways Australians are viewing television, and to meet our clients’ needs.

• OzTAM’s service has steadily evolved since launch:

• 2001: live viewing to five free-to air channels on in-home TV sets in the five mainland capital cities.
• Today: live and playback free-to-air viewing in the five mainland metropolitan markets and subscription TV nationally (‘TAM’), live and ‘on demand’ BVOD viewing on connected devices nationally (‘VPM’), and Total TV (‘VOZ’) – capturing wherever, whenever, whatever Australians are viewing.

• OzTAM’s in-home panels have been progressively expanded as Australia's population grows and people continue to spread their viewing across new channels.

• Households are recruited onto OzTAM's panel via a large-scale Establishment Survey, comprising 65,000+ interviews annually, that helps define the population to be represented and its characteristics, combined with population estimates from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The survey spans the composition of panel households (age, sex, occupation groups), as well as screens and viewing technologies in the home, to ensure the panel accurately reflects the overall population OzTAM provides data for.

• OzTAM investigates opportunities to identify and develop new tools and data that allow broadcasters to maximise their audiences, and advertisers to reach them.

Accessibility 

OzTAM believes equal access to OzTAM ratings data benefits everyone in the media industry.

• All OzTAM data subscribers – broadcasters, media agencies and others – have access to the same ratings data on the same terms.

• OzTAM’s Gold Standard software accreditation system gives clients a choice of third party (independent) ratings analysis software providers. 

Responsibility

To preserve the quality and integrity of OzTAM data, proprietary data services wishing to work with OzTAM must observe the same levels of accountability and transparency, and observe OzTAM’s policies on combining OzTAM data with other research data.

• OzTAM data licence agreements have strict usage guidelines in place.