Common Media Terms and Formulas

Public media has many strengths beyond ratings and we know it is best to focus on these strengths when positioning public media to a sponsor prospect. While it is often possible to direct the conversation completely away from ratings, it is sometimes necessary — especially when working with an agency or a sophisticated marketing professional — to talk in terms of “media math”. The following section is intended to help you understand the language of ratings and commercial radio sales terminology, so you are better equipped to speak this language. We’ve broken it out by terms and formulas.

Common Media Terms

Defined below are the most common terms that you may be expected to know when working with clients who are “Media Math” savvy.

Above the Fold/Below the Fold: Where an ad sits on a page. “The Fold” is the part of the web page that is initially visible to users during first load, based on a standard screen size.

Ad Server: A server dedicated to serving ads. Ad Servers allow campaigns to be trafficked in an inexpensive and efficient manner.

Affidavits: Some agencies will expect an affidavit confirming that the spots they purchased ran as ordered. The affidavit is sent to the advertiser or agency along with the invoice of charges as proof of services rendered.

AQH (Average Quarter Hour): An estimate of the number of people who listen to a station for at least 5 minutes within a 15 minute quarter hour. It is the most precise estimate of how many people are listening to a station at any given time. This is important to your client as it is the most accurate measurement of how many people might hear any single underwriting announcement.

Avails: Short for availabilities. In broadcasting, a period of unsold advertising time that is available for sale to an advertiser. Specifically, your client is asking what programs/dayparts are available for sponsorship.

Broadcast Calendar or Broadcast Month: A calendar used in the radio and TV industry which contains months of four or five whole weeks, each week beginning on a Monday. Each quarter in the broadcast calendar contains 13 weeks. Agencies will expect to be billed according to what spots ran during this period as opposed to a standard 30 or 31 day month. The Radio Advertising Bureau offers downloadable broadcast calendars here.

Campaign: A set of ads and instructions for a given advertiser that defines when, where and to whom digital and other ads will be delivered.

Click-through: The process of clicking through a digital advertisement to the advertiser’s destination

Click-through Rate (CTR): In digital advertising, the average number of click-throughs per hundred ad impressions, expressed as a percentage

Conversion Rate: The percentage of users who complete a desired action (e.g., purchase or registration) compared to all users who were exposed to a digital ad.

Cost Per Point (CPP): A way to measure the cost efficiency of the buy. Specifically, it measures the cost to reach one percent (point) of the desired audience. The CPP is the total cost of the flight divided by the total Gross Rating Points (GRPs). Note that these are mathematical reference points for buyers that are “Media Math” savvy. If your client is not familiar with these terms, it is better to use more concrete numbers like CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and total impressions.

Cost Per Thousand Impressions (CPM): In digital advertising, the cost an advertiser pays per one thousand advertisement impressions on a web page.The total price paid in a CPM deal is calculated by multiplying the CPM rate by the number of CPM units. For example, 20,000 impressions at a $10 CPM equals a $200 total price.

Cume: An estimate of the number of different people who listen to a station within a given daypart. The higher the cumulative audience, the larger the potential audience will be. This term is synonymous with unduplicated audience.

Demographics: The statistical breakdown of the population within a given area. A client’s “target” for a product or service may be different from a media audience. Therefore, you will need to have a strong understanding of the client’s target and then translate it to your radio audience. Nielsen Audio typically breaks out listener data by age and gender. If you have additional qualitative data such as Scarborough, Media Audit or MRI, this will be a help in making the case for the quality of our audience.

Display advertising: A form of digital advertising where the message is shown on a destination desktop, mobile or out-of-home site. Also known as “banner” advertising.

Dynamic Ad Insertion: Process by which an ad is inserted into a digital property in response to a user’s request. At its simplest, it allows for multiple ads to be rotated through one or more spaces. It also allows for alteration of specific ads placed on a digital property based on any data available to the placement program. Ad placement can be affected by demographic data or usage history for the current user, in more advanced applications.

Frequency: The average number of times a person in a target audience was reached with an sponsorship message. Often a goal set by media planners to dictate successful performance of a campaign.

Frequency Cap: A limit to the times a user will be exposed to ad in a set time period.

Geotargeting: In digital advertising, displaying (or preventing the display of) ad content based on the user’s location.

Gross Rating Points or Gross Impressions: These are the total number of rating points a schedule will deliver in a given week. These numbers indicate the total contribution of your station to the overall buy.

Gross vs Net: Agencies are customarily paid a 15% commission on all of the media they buy for their clients. Because of this there are two terms you need to be familiar with—gross rates and net rates.  The net rate is the rate your station will receive from the agency; the gross rate is the rate the agency will charge their client—typically 15% over your net rate.  Most stations publish their gross rates on their rate cards and in proposals.  If you quote net rates to an agency, let the media buyer know up front so they can “gross up” the numbers you provided into the quote they give the client, so the agency will be paid for its work.

Impressions: In broadcasting, the number of homes or individuals exposed to an advertisement or group of advertisements. In digital advertising, the main method for measuring ads. The number of ads served in a given time frame.

Insertion Order: A contract between a client and station that lists the specific terms of a digital campaign

Mid-Roll: An ad that runs in the middle of content

Nielsen Audio: (Formerly Arbitron) is an international media and marketing research firm serving radio broadcasters, cable companies, advertisers, advertising agencies and outdoor advertising companies in the United States, Mexico and Europe. Nielsen Audio is the source for ratings information for public and commercial radio stations.

On-Demand: Allows the user to listen to or watch content at his or her schedule’s convenience. On-demand content can be streamed or downloaded, depending on the publisher/distributor and/or the device.

Open Rate: The percentage of the total number of subscribers who opened an e-mail or e-newsletter.

Optimum Efficiency Schedule (OES): Frequently used in commercial media, this rating formula – Cume over AQH (Average Quarter Hour audience) times 3.29 equals OES – was designed to expose a commercial to listeners 3.5 times over the course of a week. The theory is that listeners must hear a commercial three and one-half times in any one-week period before it registers at a frequency that enables them to recall it and make a “buying decision.” Learn more about calculating an OES for your station.

Pre-Roll: An ad proceeding audio/video content

Post-Roll: An ad that runs after on-demand or podcast content

Programmatic: A method of buying digital ads using automated systems, such as digital ad exchanges. Usually buyers place bids with minimum and maximum prices.

Qualitative Data: The process of collecting and analyzing data which is nonnumerical, such as language, and which is concerned with the subjective meaning of an experience to an individual. Qualitative data covers things such as socioeconomic characteristics, lifestyles, shopping habits, travel history, products purchased, brands purchased, health insurance coverage, leisure activities, and other selected consumer characteristics important to local media and advertisers. In short, descriptive information (as opposed to numerical). NPR provides qualitative audience data for use by member stations in the NPR Audience Profile. This is national data that typically applies in local markets as well. Local qualitative data is available for purchase from companies like Media Audio and Scarborough.

Quantitative data: The process of collecting and analyzing numerical data. This type of data can be used to construct graphs and tables which show patterns and averages. In short, information about quantities (as opposed to descriptive information). Nielsen Audio is the primary source for the majority of quantitative and “ratings” data for both public and commercial radio.

Rating: The percentage of a gender/age group in a geographical area that is listening in a given 15 minute period. Buyers use this to determine what percentage of their target market will be reached.

Reach: The percentage of people reached in a certain geographical measurement area exposed at least once to an advertising schedule over a specific period of time. Often a goal set by media planners to dictate successful performance of a campaign. A single station is not expected to hit the reach goal, but the combination of stations selected for the buy/campaign is designed to.

Request for Proposal (RFP): Inquiries made by potential underwriters and agencies to determine how a station would recommend a marketing budget be spent.

Rich Media: Ads with which users can interact (as opposed to solely animation) in a Web page format, for example “expanding” ads, where a small banner can be expanded to show a larger ad.

Roadblock: In digital advertising, when an advertiser is guaranteed that each ad placement on a page will serve only their ads.

ROS: Run of Schedule (broadcast) or Run of Site (digital), ads rotate throughout the broadcast schedule or digital properties at a schedule set by the station versus the client. Ad rates for ROS buys are typically lower.

Sessions: The number of starts to an audio stream or on-demand content..

Share: The percentage of people with the radio on at a given time that are listening to a given station. Good for determining a station’s “market share” among people listening—not as good a measure from a marketer’s perspective, but instructive in looking at the radio market.

Share-of-voice (SOV): A way of buying a percentage of available impressions For example, with a 50% SOV, a sponsor’s ads would show up for 50% of the ads served.

Streaming: A method of viewing video or listening to audio content (and corresponding ads) without actually downloading the media files.

Subscribers: The number of people who opt-in or pay to receive a regular content or e-communications service.

Unique Visitors: The number of unduplicated individuals that visit a website or listen to/watch to audio/video content.

Common Media Formulas

Below are some standard formulas used in media sales.