IRS, RAM, BARC and WAM

▪ The Indian Readership Survey (IRS) is the largest

continuous readership research study in the world. IRS was
launched in the year 1995 with an objective of setting an
industry standard for readership & other media
measurement, & to provide insights on media & product
consumption as well as consumer behaviour patterns.
▪ IRS covers nearly 70 cities, 1178 towns and 2894 villages
with the coverage being reviewed before the start of every
round. The universe for IRS has been defined as the total
resident urban and rural population of India aged 12 years
and over.
▪ IRS is a study conducted to assess reach and
penetration of all media.
▪ The IRS gives information on readership/
viewership/ listenership and net access for Press,
Television, Cinema, Radio, Internet, product user
ship information at both the household and the
individual level.
▪ The findings of this research are very critical for
scientific and accurate media planners, especially
for brands where huge budgets are earmarked for
marketing/advertising spends.
▪ Using the IRS, you can generate a complete multi-media
evaluation of Press, TV, Radio, Cinema and Internet in India.
▪ IRS is the largest media survey ever conducted providing a
single-source database for demographics, media habits and
product / brand usage across 741 towns and more than 2200
villages. The IRS team of ORGMARG covered the entire country,
working exclusively on the IRS every day of the year. The team
interviewed more than 200,000 households and 300,000
individuals.
▪ This all-India survey was conducted jointly with the Media
Research Users' Council (MRUC).
▪ It provides product / brand penetration information for over 50
different products allowing one to link media habits and
product usage data for adults and children from the age of 12.
▪ http://www.allaboutnewspapers.com/indian-readership-
survey-irs-q1-2019-report-shows-print-still-alive-kicking/
BROADCAST AUDIENCE RESEARCH
COUNCIL (BARC)
Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India is a
joint-industry not-for-profit body that publishes weekly TV
viewership data for India. It is mandated to design, commission,
supervise, and own a television audience measurement system
for India, and provides Indian broadcast sector with a real-time
television rating point (TRP) measurement system.

➢BARC (Broadcast Audience Research Council) India is an

industry body set up to design, commission, supervise and own an
accurate, reliable and timely television audience measurement
system for India. BARC India brings together the three key
stakeholders in television audience measurement - broadcasters,
advertisers, and advertising and media agencies, via their apex
bodies.
▪ BARC India was set up by the three key stakeholder
bodies in Indian broadcast sector - the Indian
Broadcast Foundation (IBF), Advertising
Agencies Association of India (AAAI) and Indian
Society of Advertisers (ISA). It uses Audio
Watermarking technology to measure viewership of
TV channels, and the system also allows
measurement of time-shifted viewing and
simulcasts. The company was incorporated in 2010
and is based in Mumbai, India.
GENESIS OF BARC INDIA
▪ Nielsen (the owner of TAM Media along with Kantar Media) was
sued by Indian TV channel NDTV for $810 million for fraud and
$580 million for negligence in a New York court. NDTV’s
weighty lawsuit—194 pages; targeted at over 30 companies and
individuals; and $1.4 billion in damages—against TAM and its
investors accused them of deliberately publishing corrupt and
tainted data, favoring rival channels in return for bribes.
▪ NDTV also alleged that Nielsen and Kantar were not funding
TAM India adequately in order to increase its scale and invest in
systems, security and quality procedures. A statement in the
lawsuit read: “The primary remedy (of the corrupt activities)
was to increase sample size from 8,000 boxes to 30,000 boxes,
immediately stopping publication of data until the sample size
was increased to appropriate levels."
▪The case was dismissed by the New York
court on the issue of jurisdiction and asked
NDTV to fight the legal battle in India.
▪NDTV subsequently unsubscribed from
TAM's services only to subscribe again in
May 2014 citing the lack of alternate sources
for such data as the TAM provided and the
arrival of BARC as a new measuring
standard in the industry.
▪ Web Audience Measurement (WAM) is audience measurement and
website analytics tool that measures Internet usage in India.
▪ It is a joint effort of IMRB International and Internet and Mobile
Association of India surveys over 6000 individuals across 8
metropolitan centers in India.
▪ It measures variety of metrics such as time-on-site, exposure, reach and
frequency of Internet usage.
▪ It uses audience measurement and is a continuous tracking panel study
that provides cross sectional data on Internet usage segmented by
gender, SEC and location.
▪ Web Rating Points factor multiple measures of Internet usage to provide
a more comprehensive picture to web advertisers and attempts to
standardize web analytics in India.
▪ TAM Research Media released Radio Audience Measurement
(RAM) tool since there was no continuous tracking tool for radio
listenership in India. Unlike the existing Indian Listenership
Track (ILT) tool that follows the day after recall methodology
involving mostly top-of-the-mind recall and not actual
listenership, the RAM works with the diary method.

▪ The diary method is reportedly the most widely used method

around the world. The most common type of radio listening
diary runs for one week and is filled in by one person. Usually
there’s one page opening for each day, with quarter-hour units
down the page, and one column for each station.
➢RAM is necessary since in a metro where there are seven-eight
players, the advertisers needs to know what kind of market he is
going to cater to. Each of them is trying to be innovative, in terms of
promotions and marketing efforts. To gauge the effects of this
market, you need a study, which is continuous in nature so that the
effects can be monitored.

➢According to L V Krishnan. CEO. TAM Research Media RAM has the

potential to assist planners and advertisers with budget allocations
and radio strategy since the information available from RAM, fused
with the Adex data, will be a very strong database. He also
explained some more advantages for the advertisers who will be
using RAM. Firstly, advertisers will get to know who they are talking
to since presently with the content being the same in all stations,
most of the advertisers do not know who they are talking to.
▪ Also, there can be segmentation by localized vis-a-
vis nationalized advertising, when advertisers can
understand the listenership of each city and isolate
them. And lastly, the study will also help to
understand how creatively sound can be used and
the impact of sound of the brands per se.