MARSA LLC is the official technology partner of Kantar, one of the world’s leading media research companies. Irada Sultanova, Managing Director of MARSA, spoke about the work of the company in an interview “Report”az.

We present this interview to our readers:

-Since the beginning of 2023, your company has started measuring the TV audience and ratings in Azerbaijan. But, as far as we know, TV viewing has been measured in Azerbaijan since 1998. What is the difference between MARSA and its predecessors? Is it true that today in Azerbaijan they use the latest technologies to measure television audience and television viewing? How would you rate the level of measurement in the country?

– Since January 2023, MARSA has started its activity and has been providing television measurement data to the market for the 3rd month. I can say with confidence that in Azerbaijan we use the most advanced technology in the world to measure the audience. Moreover, Azerbaijan is the first and so far the only country in the world that has introduced and started measuring audience and TV viewing throughout the country, using PM7 tablet meters. Today, the PM7 is the latest development from Kantar Media, the world’s leading measurement company operating in more than 70 countries. Already, colleagues from other countries who are just starting the transition to new PM7 technologies are turning to us for consultations. I think that this is one of the main differences between our company and its predecessors, we not only expanded the geography of measurements throughout Azerbaijan, increased and strengthened the panel from 180 to 950 households, introduced the latest technologies, but also presented the country in an innovative light in the international market in the field of audience measurements. Azerbaijan and our project has become one of the most interesting and visible in 2022 in the field of audience measurement. Our project was discussed at the International Kantara Summit in London, at the PAMRO conference in South Africa and at the ASI International Conference in France.

MARSA measures everything people watch on the big screen. These are 15 local TV channels, foreign TV channels, primarily Russian and Turkish ones, the use of TV smart functions, such as watching Youtube or other video platforms. The technology we use allows you to monitor TV viewing on any type of connection – whether satellite, cable, IPTV or traditional terrestrial.

Separately, it should be noted that the quality and accuracy of measurements directly depends on the number of households connected to the measurements (panel size) and their ratio to the population of the country. So, Azerbaijan is one of the countries with the most ideal ratio of 1:10,000. For example, in Turkey this ratio is 1:21,000, Germany – 1:15,000, Russia – 1:16,000, USA – 1:7900, etc. d. Given this factor, we can confidently state that Azerbaijan is now in the list of leading countries in terms of the quality of telemetry.

– What did the results of measurements of the first quarter show? How has TV viewing changed in the country in recent years? There have already been heated discussions on some results on the Internet and social networks and certain conclusions have been drawn – how true are they?

– I want to note right away that in fact, in Azerbaijan, a very small number of people, even among workers in the media and TV industry, are able to “read” ratings, understand, draw conclusions and analyze data, access to which we provide to our clients (subscribers). Unfortunately, in our country we often encounter discussions and publicly drawn incorrect conclusions by people who do not have sufficient competence in the field of measurements. Usually, this is done on the basis of some fragmentary data that is taken out of context and unknown how it got to social network users, bloggers.

To draw a conclusion about ratings, TV viewing and preferences of the television audience, two or three excerpts from an Excel spreadsheet and basic knowledge of mathematics are definitely not enough. People who are not related to this area do not have the opportunity to delve into details, they judge superficially and can interpret patients’ cardiograms with the same success.

Therefore, I consider it important for us to inform in more detail about the results of the first quarter. In order not to delve into the terminology and measurement methodology, I will simply talk about the complex, and use the term “average TV viewing” – which means the average amount of time that the TV is turned on in the household.

It is clear that there are families in which TV is watched a couple of hours a week, but there are families where the TV is turned on every day in the early morning and turned off late at night. All this information is sent to our servers via the Internet and processed there. Based on the results of the first three months, we can share the following data: the average TV viewing per day in Azerbaijan is 9.3 hours per household, 5 hours 10 minutes per individual. Average TV viewing per day in Baku is 4 hours 39 minutes per individual. From this we can conclude that TV viewing in Baku is lower than in the regions.

Out of 100% of the time spent watching video content on TV, 26% is spent watching Internet content – Youtube, platforms like Netflix, AppleTV, IVI, Mega or pirated content. We can say that this time is not considered television viewing, but in most cases, on the same Youtube, viewers prefer to watch content created by TV channels.
As for traditional television viewing, 16% is given to Turkish TV channels, 2% to Russian, and 56% to local ones.

– And how do you comment on the fact that in the same social networks people say that they do not watch local TV, but only foreign ones. Do you have such families?

-Such families also exist, of course, but they are a minority. At the moment, their number is about 2% of 100% of families that are connected to the measurements. Just recently, we discussed this issue with representatives of TV channels and advertising agencies, and came to the conclusion that such families should remain in the studies for the sake of completeness. Although in some countries, if the market wishes, only those who watch local TV channels participate in the measurements, but we and our colleagues considered that it would be optimal to preserve the maximum reflection of the reality of television viewing in our country.

– Over time, it is clear, but what about the number of people constantly watching TV?

– I can answer that it is impossible to give an exact figure, since the audience or viewers are a constantly changing value, which is influenced by a lot of factors, ranging from weather, season and ending with holidays or the political situation in the country. Therefore, we will talk about the average daily audience. Over the past three months, an average of 6,029,000 people watched TV per day. At the same time, local TV channels – 5,287,000 people, Turkish – 3,438,000, Russian – 1,228,000, other platforms through TV – 5,000,000 people.

As you can see, the sum of individual looks is greater than the total look. This is so because we don’t have many people watching only one type of TV channel. People can watch a local channel, then Turkish, then Russian, and then turn on Youtube on smart TV. Therefore, it is important to take into account not only the number of people, but also the time they spend watching TV.

– And what is the balance between local TV channels, which channels are in the TOP-10?

– Frankly, our clients do not want to publicly share this information, as it is likely to become a tool for information manipulation in the media and create a false impression among readers. For example, let’s take the rating of a conditional news channel – 0.3% and the rating of a conditional TV channel with a predominance of show programs (conditionally – a show channel) – 3%. An outsider gets the impression that the news channel is watched 10 times less, and this information will be presented in this way. But in fact, upon detailed study, we see that the news channel is watched by 1.5 million people a day, and the show channel is twice as much – 3 million. The only difference is that the show channel is watched longer, due to long programs or films, on average one and a half hours, and the news channel is only 15 minutes. And that’s okay

Or, another example of manipulation, let’s say the leading TV channels have an average rating of 2-3 percent. This is a fairly high rating by all world standards, but an uninitiated person may assume that only 3% of the population watches this channel, while in fact 40% of the population watches it daily.

As I noted earlier, in the three months of 2023, over 6 million people watched television every day. Someone can interpret this in such a way that 60% of the population watches television, respectively, 40% of the population do not watch it, and so present it in the media, we have already observed such cases in the past. But what is actually overlooked is that this is an average daily figure, and if you take the average monthly percentage of people who watch TV, then it is over 95% of the population.

Therefore, there is such an agreement that the channel ratings remain within the professional community and are available only to subscribers, our clients, whom we preliminarily train in using the software and how to properly read data, analyze and draw conclusions. In the near future, we plan to publicly launch general reports on our website www.marsa.az

-However, what general conclusions can be drawn? Simply put, what is the Azerbaijani viewer watching?

– In a very general way, Azerbaijan can be classified as a country with relatively high TV viewing. Unlike many countries, our viewer has the opportunity to watch and understand the TV channels of neighboring countries, especially Turkey, while still largely preferring local television. The average daily audience of individual TV channels starts from a minimum of 600-700 thousand, and ends with 3.5 million for the leading TV channels. That is, we can say that the viewer chooses content according to his taste/interest from a variety of local and foreign TV channels, but our Azerbaijani content prevails.

Also, for our viewers, using a TV to watch streaming platforms is already a common thing. So far, we do not have the opportunity to monitor the dynamics, but we think this figure will grow over time.

Thus, we can say that there is a constant struggle between local, foreign TV channels and streaming platforms for the attention of the Azerbaijani viewer, because our viewer is provided with access to extremely diverse content. The same applies to the types of content – it cannot be said that the Azerbaijani viewer is “fixated” on any particular genre. Of course, the entertainment part, as elsewhere in the world, is in high demand here, but the same people watch cognitive and educational content, and sports, and information.

– The last question, how will the ratings affect the quality of our TV channels?

-Our job is to provide TV channels with accurate, high-quality and timely audience data, organize trainings on the use of software and audience analysis, provide information on innovations and global trends in the field of audience measurement, regularly interact with the market and discuss pressing issues regarding TV viewing in Azerbaijan.

And how the TV channels will manage the data, what strategy they will choose and with what funds they will implement it – this is no longer our area of ​​responsibility. Of course, those channels that manage data wisely will gain an advantage in the highly competitive environment in which they are located.