A new white paper from the media owner and agency group says that further development is needed before such data is ready to replace or be combined with traditional panel-based measurement of TV audiences.

For starters, CIMM says “there is not enough STB data available at this time to create a national representative sample which is a requirement for stakeholders”.

In its ‘Roadmap for Set-Top Box Data’, the coalition sees the greatest potential – at least in the short term – for using the data in local TV measurement and as a measurement tool for addressable advertising and database marketing initiatives.

CIMM says: “Appending custom and large industry databases to STB data for segmentation purposes does not require representative samples and will enable advertisers to transform television into a direct marketing tool with revenue producing capabilities.

“As our next project, CIMM seeks to work with the database companies to provide greater transparency and to help the industry understand how best to combine these secondary databases with STB viewing data.”

The coalition says it has chosen to focus its efforts on database matching instead of local measurement as the use of STB data in that context is “already advancing in the marketplace”. Though local samples still need to be more representative, CIMM said it’s generally felt that the ability to get larger samples sizes with greater granularity than current measurement approaches allow for is “a vast improvement”.

“Because of this, local measurement should have a fairly short timeline for implementation and adoption, perhaps within the next year,” says CIMM.

Read and download the complete white paper here.