Nielsen launches interoperable measurement ecosystem with Realeyes partnership

Nielsen announced the launch of its Outcomes Marketplace on July 31, 2025, introducing an interoperable ecosystem for partner measurement within its Nielsen ONE platform. This marks the first time brand, sales, attention, and conversion metrics will be integrated into a single platform, expanding measurement capabilities beyond traditional reach and frequency data.

Realeyes will serve as the first measurement provider at launch. The attention measurement and creative effectiveness company brings its technology that provides understanding of attention and emotive response across platforms, identifying specific elements of campaigns and creative content that engage consumers most effectively. Their ad scoring system predicts brand sales outcomes and measures media cost efficiency on social and video platforms.

The integration represents a significant technical advancement in advertising measurement infrastructure. Nielsen's measurement system processes person-level data from panels comprising over 1.2 million individuals, combined with what the company describes as the industry's largest big data footprint. This foundation provides coverage across digital, linear, streaming, and connected TV platforms.

Realeyes has built its performance scores and recommendations on more than 18 million human observations, analyzing attention and emotion across over 350 billion frames of video content spanning 90 countries. The company applies facial coding technology to predictive, big-data analytics, generating business outcome insights for advertisers seeking to understand creative performance at scale.

According to Nichole Henderson, GM of Global Campaign Analytics at Nielsen, the Outcomes Marketplace demonstrates the company's commitment to measuring business results rather than just impressions. The platform enables clients to connect powerful metrics for actionable campaign insights within an open, interoperable ecosystem. Henderson emphasized that working with industry leaders like Realeyes allows for seamless integration of measurement capabilities.

Mihkel Jäätma, CEO of Realeyes, highlighted the fundamental principle that ad impressions are not equal. Understanding creative strength becomes essential for managing total campaign potential and performance, according to Jäätma. The collaboration with Nielsen's Outcomes Marketplace will increase accessibility for brands seeking to understand consumer response to advertising and gain insights into how ad creative contributes to sales outcomes and cost-per-mille efficiency.

The announcement signals Nielsen's continued measurement innovation following recent industry developments. Nielsen integrated attention metrics into its campaign effectiveness measurement through a partnership with Realeyes in December 2024, laying the groundwork for this expanded marketplace approach.

Influential powered by Captiv8 has become one of the first adopters of Nielsen's new Attention Measurement solution. The leading influencer marketing platform recently leveraged the tool to track attention and effectiveness across key elements of creator campaigns. Krishna Subramanian, CEO at Captiv8, noted that Nielsen's attention metrics raise the bar for influencer marketing by enabling deeper measurement beyond surface-level metrics to demonstrate real campaign impact.

The technical infrastructure supporting the Outcomes Marketplace builds on Nielsen's existing measurement capabilities. The company recently launched the second edition of its Ad Supported Gauge, providing advertisers with comprehensive share of viewing data on ad-supported platforms. This measurement approach addresses the fragmentation of audience attention across traditional television, streaming services, and digital channels.

Nielsen will announce additional measurement providers later in 2025 that will deliver metrics across the full spectrum of campaign performance. These upcoming integrations will include ad engagement, audience attention, brand perception shifts, and sales conversions, expanding the marketplace's analytical capabilities for advertisers seeking comprehensive performance insights.

This development occurs amid broader industry momentum toward attention-based measurement methodologies. Multiple measurement providers expanded attention capabilities throughout 2024 and 2025, reflecting growing advertiser demand for granular engagement insights beyond traditional viewability metrics.

The measurement technology landscape continues expanding as major providers introduce attention capabilities. DoubleVerify recently introduced social media attention measurement through a partnership with Snapchat, while Integral Ad Science expanded its Quality Attention measurement to mobile in-app environments. These developments demonstrate the advertising technology sector's coordinated shift toward attention-based measurement methodologies.

Research conducted by Kantar analyzing 873 campaigns and $3.2 billion in media spend found that overall channel attention levels do not directly correlate with brand contributions or cost-effectiveness. This research suggests some advertisers may be overinvesting in high-attention placements, highlighting the need for more sophisticated measurement approaches like Nielsen's marketplace model.

The Outcomes Marketplace addresses measurement challenges that have historically complicated comprehensive campaign analysis. Prior measurement approaches often required advertisers to work with multiple vendors for different metrics, creating data silos and integration complexities. Nielsen's interoperable ecosystem aims to consolidate these previously scattered solutions into a unified platform.

For the marketing community, this announcement represents a significant step toward more holistic campaign measurement. The industry has witnessed programmatic advertising growth reaching 72% according to recent data, with 80% of marketers emphasizing the need for deduplicated reach and frequency measurement in programmatic environments.

The platform's ability to analyze creator content alongside traditional advertising reflects the growing importance of diverse content types in modern marketing strategies. The technology evaluates performance across different markets and audience segments, providing insights into how creative elements resonate with various viewer groups across multiple channels and platforms.

Nielsen's comprehensive approach to audience measurement continues evolving alongside changing media consumption patterns. The company maintains measurement infrastructure that processes data across traditional linear television, streaming platforms, digital channels, and Connected TV environments, reflecting the increasingly fragmented nature of media consumption.

The Outcomes Marketplace availability begins immediately for Nielsen clients. The platform integrates with Nielsen's broader cross-media measurement capabilities that support various aspects of marketing workflow management, from planning through optimization and outcome analysis.

This announcement builds on Nielsen's track record of measurement innovation and industry collaboration. The company has expanded Nielsen ONE to include outcomes measurement, advanced audience metrics, and planning capabilities while implementing Big Data + Panel measurement methodologies that combine large-scale data analysis with traditional panel-based approaches.

Technical implementation details reveal that the system evaluates creator content and ad versioning across multiple markets and audience segments. The AI-powered recommendations surface specific tactics for improving ad performance, while attention heatmaps provide granular analysis of visual elements driving attention performance across campaigns.

Timeline

• October 2023 - Nielsen announces partnership with LG Ad Solutions to access ACR data footprint for national TV measurement
• January 2024 - IAS launches Quality Attention measurement in partnership with Lumen Research, integrating media quality with eye-tracking data
• February 2024 - Nielsen expands National TV out-of-home panel to achieve 100% coverage of U.S. households
• July 2024 - Kantar study challenges conventional attention wisdom analyzing $3.2 billion in media spend across 873 campaigns
• July 2024 - IAS expands Quality Attention to mobile in-app environments
• December 2024 - Nielsen integrates attention metrics into campaign effectiveness measurementthrough Realeyes partnership
• January 2025 - Nielsen ends legacy TV ratings, transitioning to Big Data + Panel approach
• February 2025 - Programmatic advertising growth reaches 72% with increased focus on attention measurement
• April 2025 - ReachTV enables airport ad measurement with Nielsen ONE Ads integration
• June 2025 - DoubleVerify debuts social attention measurement with Snapchat partnership
• July 2025 - IAB Europe explores attention metrics influence on programmatic decisions
• July 31, 2025 - Nielsen launches Outcomes Marketplace with Realeyes as first measurement provider

Key Terms Explained

Attention Measurement Attention measurement represents a sophisticated approach to evaluating advertising effectiveness that goes beyond traditional metrics like viewability and impressions. This methodology combines eye-tracking technology, facial coding, and machine learning algorithms to assess how consumers actually engage with advertising content. The technology measures where viewers focus their attention, for how long, and with what emotional response, providing advertisers with granular insights into creative performance. Unlike conventional metrics that simply track whether an ad was displayed, attention measurement evaluates the quality of consumer engagement, helping brands understand which creative elements drive genuine audience connection and business outcomes.

Nielsen ONE Nielsen ONE serves as the company's comprehensive cross-media measurement platform designed to unify previously fragmented measurement solutions into a single connected experience. The platform integrates audience planning, cross-media measurement, and outcomes analysis capabilities, allowing advertisers to define audiences, build campaign scenarios, measure performance, and optimize delivery from one interface. Built on person-level data from panels and big data footprints, Nielsen ONE provides deduplicated metrics across digital, linear, streaming, and connected TV environments. The platform addresses the industry challenge of measuring audience behavior across increasingly fragmented media consumption patterns.

Realeyes Realeyes operates as a leader in attention measurement and creative effectiveness, applying facial coding technology to predictive analytics for advertising optimization. The company has built its measurement capabilities on more than 18 million human observations, analyzing attention and emotion across over 350 billion frames of video content spanning 90 countries. Their technology generates performance scores and recommendations that predict brand sales outcomes and measure media cost efficiency on social and video platforms. Realeyes' AI-powered system identifies specific elements of campaigns and creative content that engage consumers most effectively, providing actionable insights for creative optimization.

Interoperable Ecosystem An interoperable ecosystem in advertising measurement refers to a platform architecture that allows different measurement providers and data sources to work together seamlessly within a unified environment. This approach eliminates data silos that traditionally required advertisers to work with multiple vendors for different metrics, creating integration complexities and inconsistent reporting. Nielsen's Outcomes Marketplace exemplifies this concept by enabling various measurement partners to contribute specialized metrics while maintaining data consistency and unified reporting standards. The ecosystem approach allows advertisers to access comprehensive performance insights without managing multiple vendor relationships or reconciling disparate data sources.

Cross-Media Measurement Cross-media measurement encompasses the ability to track and analyze consumer behavior and campaign performance across multiple advertising channels and platforms simultaneously. This approach addresses the fragmentation of modern media consumption, where audiences engage with content across traditional television, streaming services, social media, digital platforms, and connected TV environments. Effective cross-media measurement provides deduplicated audience metrics, ensuring accurate reach calculations when the same consumers encounter campaigns across different channels. The methodology enables advertisers to understand the incremental impact of each media channel and optimize budget allocation across their entire media mix.

Big Data Footprint Nielsen's big data footprint refers to the company's extensive collection of viewing and engagement data sourced from approximately 45 million households and 75 million connected devices. This data comes from partnerships with companies including Comcast, Dish, DIRECTV, Roku, and other major distributors and streaming platforms. The big data approach complements traditional panel-based measurement by providing scale and coverage that individual panels cannot achieve alone. This methodology captures actual viewing behavior across multiple devices and platforms, offering insights into how audiences consume content in real-world environments rather than controlled research settings.

Creative Effectiveness Creative effectiveness measurement evaluates how specific creative elements within advertising campaigns influence consumer response and business outcomes. This analysis goes beyond measuring reach and frequency to assess which visual elements, messages, and creative approaches drive attention, engagement, and conversion. Advanced creative effectiveness measurement uses attention heatmaps, emotional response analysis, and performance scoring to identify which creative components contribute most significantly to campaign success. The methodology enables advertisers to optimize creative elements based on data-driven insights rather than subjective creative judgment, leading to more effective advertising content.

Connected TV (CTV) Connected TV represents television content delivered through internet-connected devices rather than traditional broadcast or cable infrastructure. This category includes smart TVs, streaming devices, gaming consoles, and other internet-enabled viewing platforms that deliver video content through broadband connections. CTV has emerged as a dominant force in media consumption, with its share of media budgets projected to double from 14% in 2023 to 28% in 2025. The platform enables more precise audience targeting and measurement compared to traditional television, allowing advertisers to leverage digital advertising capabilities within television viewing environments.

Panel-Based Measurement Panel-based measurement relies on data collected from representative samples of consumers who agree to have their media consumption tracked and reported. Nielsen's traditional approach used panels comprising over 1.2 million individuals across carefully selected households to generate viewing statistics and audience demographics. Panel participants provide detailed demographic information and consent to comprehensive tracking of their media consumption across various platforms and devices. While panel-based measurement offers demographic precision and controlled data collection, it requires statistical modeling to extrapolate findings to broader populations, which can limit scale and real-time responsiveness.

Programmatic Advertising Programmatic advertising represents the automated buying and selling of digital advertising inventory through technology platforms that use data and algorithms to make purchasing decisions in real-time. This approach enables advertisers to target specific audiences across multiple platforms and optimize campaigns based on performance data. Recent industry data shows 72% of marketers plan to increase programmatic advertising investment in 2025, with growing emphasis on attention measurement and cross-channel optimization. Programmatic platforms integrate various measurement solutions to provide advertisers with comprehensive performance insights and automated optimization capabilities across their digital advertising campaigns.

Summary

Who: Nielsen, a global leader in audience measurement, data, and analytics, in partnership with Realeyes, a leader in attention measurement and creative effectiveness. Influential powered by Captiv8 serves as an early adopter of the attention measurement solution.

What: Launch of the Outcomes Marketplace, an interoperable ecosystem for partner measurement that integrates brand, sales, attention, and conversion metrics within Nielsen ONE platform for the first time, expanding measurement capabilities beyond traditional reach and frequency data.

When: Announced on July 31, 2025, with immediate availability for Nielsen clients. Additional measurement providers will be announced later in 2025.

Where: The platform operates within Nielsen's existing measurement infrastructure, processing person-level data from panels of over 1.2 million individuals and leveraging the industry's largest big data footprint across digital, linear, streaming, and CTV platforms.

Why: To provide advertisers with a more comprehensive view of ad outcomes alongside reach and frequency data, enabling measurement of what truly matters: real business results. The platform addresses the industry need for consolidated measurement solutions that eliminate data silos and integration complexities previously requiring multiple vendors.