ISpot.tv earns first-ever MRC accreditation as measurement battle heats up

Dive Brief:

ISpot.tv has received Media Rating Council (MRC) accreditation for its ability to identify, verify and track national TV ad occurrences across 178 linear and broadcast networks, per details shared with Marketing Dive.
The TV measurement company's ad catalog provides transparency for more than 2 million unique creative spots to date across 63,672 brands and 179 industries. This is iSpot's first-ever MRC accreditation, and the first time the MRC has accredited TV ad occurrence measurement with this granularity and scale, per the release.
The MRC accreditation could help iSpot's data serve as a baseline for a TV industry that is moving to adopt alternative currencies and achieve true cross-platform measurement, and comes as the company has made several moves to compete with rival Nielsen.

Dive Insight:

ISpot's MRC accreditation of its TV ad occurrence catalog is another big step for the measurement company as it continues to establish itself as a competitor to a beleaguered Nielsen. ISpot’s system helps advertisers verify, optimize and justify ad investments, with iSpot founder and CEO Sean Muller describing it as "the unshakable foundation" for countless transaction decisions.

"Having trusted, transparent and independently verified measurement starts with being able to deliver data — reliably, quickly and at scale — to drive value to the entire media ecosystem as it shifts from program-based measurement to an ad-centric model,” Muller said in a statement.

ISpot introduced its real-time system for TV ad cataloging in 2012 and has since provided data to brands, agencies and networks on millions of ads for tens of thousands of brands. The accreditation helps buy- and sell-side agencies reconcile data around pod placement, competitive juxtaposition and daypart, program and frequency commitments.

While the accreditation does not cover iSpot's audience measurement service, as Ad Age notes, iSpot measurement is offered as a rival currency to Nielsen by NBCUniversal and Paramount, and is used by Amazon to measure cross-screen impressions and reach for its Amazon Ads service.

The MRC accreditation is the latest move by iSpot to expand its capabilities and profile. Last week, iSpot was granted conditional certification by the U.S. Joint Industry Committee alongside Comscore and VideoAmp. Earlier this month, the company acquired next-generation measurement and attribution company, 605, adding the largest big data panel for measurement in TV. Previously, iSpot entered into a multi-year partnership with Camelot Strategic Marketing & Media, becoming the preferred video and TV measurement partner for the media agency’s clients.