AANA’s top priority is to end the practice of auto-refreshing, which artificially inflates online audience numbers by treating each computer ‘refresh’ as an additional viewer. The association said the practice skews audience data and provides a “distorted and potentially misleading picture of online penetration”.

Next, it calls for TV audience measurement during advert breaks. AANA said that some advertisers were “surprised” to find out that Australia’s TV audience measurement metric, which was introduced with the advent of digital recording and time-shifted viewing, does not pick up changes to viewing patterns during ad breaks. Advertisers will not have faith in the reported data unless this data is introduced, AANA warned.

In radio audience measurement the association is calling for paper diary systems to be replaced by meter-based techniques which “took over” other markets in the 1990s, while in print the AANA hopes for a “rapid, reliable and cost effective outcome” as a new readership survey backed by industry body Newspaper Works goes head to head with the established currency measure produced by Roy Morgan Research.

Sticking with print, the AANA says it also wants better reporting of specific issues and sections of newspapers and magazines. “Will 2011 be the year we finally get it?” the association wondered.

Further down the list, the association asked for improvements in research data relating to competitive adspend and an acceptance of online behavioural advertising was listed in eighth place.

Other issues on the list included transparency in ad agency remuneration, greater accountability in advertising and better auditing systems and practices.