There hasn’t been a new “Friends” episode since 2004, but the sitcom is one of the five most binged shows in the United States, due mostly to streaming on Netflix Inc.
That’s according to a “binge report” provided by Whip Networks Inc., also known as TV Time, a Santa Monica-based data company looking to be the future of TV-show rankings.
TV Time’s smartphone app helps fans figure out where to watch their favorite shows, from streaming services to network and cable channels. The app then tracks user data – everything from show searches to social interactions on the platform and how users rate programs – and sells insights based on that information to entertainment companies and advertisers.
The market for collecting and selling data on TV viewership has been dominated by 95-year-old Nielsen Holdings, which tracks what people are watching through devices attached to a random selection of household television sets. Nielsen has enjoyed a tight grip on the TV consumer data market effectively since television started.
But Nielsen’s set-top boxes are ill-equipped to collect data from streaming services such as Netflix.
The smartphone app may be replacing the set-top box.
TV Time’s app has 12 million users, the company says, who use the app to find, track and discuss the shows they watch
The 4-year-old startup said it has raised $65 million total from investors.
TV Time announced in November deals to sell data to Beverly Hills’ United Talent Agency as well as Ocean Media Inc., a Huntington Beach-based media consultancy.
Some analysts say TV Time could be a leader in the market for television consumer data.
“I think there is something to their ability to monetize their data, particularly to TV producers and networks who are looking for insights into what people are watching,” said Scott Ensign, vice president of digital media at media consulting group Butler/Till Media Services Inc. “They are also unique in tracking people across services that don’t otherwise share or report data.”
According to a comScore Inc. report released in May, 53 percent of U.S. households with wireless internet use a streaming TV service, and 75 percent of households that stream use Netflix.
“Television research is changing so much as television is becoming more of a digital medium,” said Jason Damata, chief executive at Venice’s Fabric Media.
TV Time was founded and is still headed by Richard Rosenblatt, the former chief executive of numerous digital media companies.
Rosenblatt helmed now defunct Intermix Media where he helped spark MySpace.com’s brief rise.
He also brought Demand Media, now known as Leaf Group, the company behind user-generated content sites including eHow.com, public in 2011 but left the company in 2013 as revenue and stock prices declined.
In addition to leading TV Time, Rosenblatt is also a senior adviser for San Francisco investment firm Raine Group, which is TV Time’s lead investor, according to company spokeswoman Tracy Akselrud.
Akselrud declined to say how much of TV Time’s $65 million raised came from Raine Group. Other investors include Compound, a New York City venture capital firm, and Institutional Venture Partners, a Menlo Park-based investment outfit.
Rosenblatt first named TV Time Whipclip, and the company’s initial focus was video sharing of app users favorite television clips.
The company, though, changed course last year, including personnel changes such as hiring former Nielsen executive Carol Hanley, as chief revenue officer.
Hanley said in an interview that she has helped to make TV Time a “TV Guide on steroids.”
The TV Time app is free and also without commercials. Users search for a show, whether widely popular fare such as the 15-season-long medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy,” or not so popular, like the 1990s adolescent cult show, “My So-Called Life.”
The app tells users whether the show is playing on any traditional TV channels and also where to stream episodes on-demand.
Messages also appear on user’s smart phones, alerting them to when a show they follow is about to be televised.
App users can also take steps beyond searching for shows.
Users can mark, for example, when they have watched each of the 19 episodes of “My So-Called Life.”
They can vote on whether protagonist Angela Chase or another show character is their favorite, create GIFs or memes based on the program and chat with other users who mark themselves as show followers.
About 30 percent of TV Time’s 12 million users utilize the app in these active ways, said Jeremy Reed, TV Times’ head of programming. It is this in-depth information on TV viewers that Reed argues is unique to TV Time.
“Nielsen measures how many people are viewing a given program,” Reed said. “TV Time provides the context to why people watch and the sentiment of how they experienced it.”
Industry insiders agree that TV Time might be carving a niche in gathering insight-heavy information.
Television data includes measurements – or how many people are watching – and insights – how viewers engage content – according to Dan Schiffman, chief revenue officer of Cambridge, Mass.-based TVision Insights Inc.
TV Time, Schiffman said, is focused on insights.
That distinguishes the company from Nielsen, which does both measurements and insights, but primarily measures TV ratings.
“TV Time is unique,” Schiffman said. “They have built this TV Guide-like app, and then collected data from enthusiasts,” engaged enough to use the app.
How lucrative this niche might be, though, is not clear.
In addition to United Talent Agency and Ocean Media, Reed declined to name companies TV Time sells its data to, except to say they “span studios, on-demand streaming platforms and traditional networks.”
None of the major Hollywood studios, on-demand streaming platforms, or traditional networks would confirm or deny that they use TV Time. TV Time is announcing deals at a time when Nielsen’s grip as the go-to source for television ratings and viewer consumer data might be slipping.
Nielsen’s revenue and operating income held steady the last two years, but its stock price has dropped more than 200 percent over that time, to $25.60 per share as of Nov. 19.
The decline in stock price preceded the purchase of a company stake in August by Paul Singer’s Elliot Management Corp.
Elliot Management is known for advocating executive leadership changes and for breaking up companies into component parts.
Shortly after Singer’s arrival, Nielsen changed chief executives. Also, according to a statement from Nielsen, the company is still undergoing a “strategic review” of how to structure its business.
For years, Nielsen’s set-top boxes and weekly viewing journals kept by randomly selected viewers were the trusted source for television measurement and insight, according to Paul Verna, senior analyst at market research company eMarketer.
But today, Verna said, “The whole Nielsen model is basically antiquated,” specifically the company’s attempts to track viewers of streaming platforms.
Nielsen came out with a tracking device to measure Netflix ratings last year, and it has not devised a methodology for measuring Amazon.com Inc. and Hulu viewers, the second and third most popular streaming services, according to the comScore report.
Nielsen’s measurement of Netflix is limited to people who stream Netflix on TVs, and it cannot track computer viewership.
And Nielsen’s methodology – like all attempts to measure Netflix viewers – is not endorsed by Netflix.
“We do not share viewing data with other companies and do not endorse the methodologies of any third-party proprietors who claim to have insights into our audience,” a Netflix spokesman said.
“I don’t know how seriously (Nielsen’s) Netflix measurement data is being taken out there in the world,” Verna said.
Brian Fuhrer, senior vice president of product leadership at Nielsen, disputed Verna’s assertion, stating that the Netflix ratings “give our clients the ability to understand the streaming impact on total TV usage.”
Nielsen has noted that its Netflix data is valuable enough that content providers including Walt Disney Co. and Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. subscribe to it.
TV Time is not the first company to try and fill the void of collecting and selling data about streaming viewers.
GetGlue, a company that a did a Foursquare-inspired check-in app in which users said when they were streaming shows, raised millions of dollars and provided an early alternative to official Facebook fan pages for certain shows.
However, the company – which later became TV Tag – shut down abruptly in 2015 amid company ownership changes.
Symphony Advanced Media Inc. gained media and investor attention with a plan to unearth data on Netflix viewership numbers. It too closed shop, in 2017, following a public relations offensive from Netflix disputing the company’s figures.
Vizio Inc. collects data about viewing habits on smart TVs it manufactures, but the Irvine-based company also paid $2.2 million to settle claims by federal and New Jersey regulators that it gathered data without TV owners’ consent.
The Vizio case sparked media scrutiny of whether competitors including San Francisco’s Samba TV Inc., and San Carlos-based Alphonso Inc. are following federal privacy guidelines.
Akselrud, of TV Time, noted users must accept the company’s eight-page privacy policy, which, on page three, mentions the possibility data might be sold.
“Our users are passionate TV fans that want to share their feedback,” Akselrud added.
As for avoiding the fate of GetGlue and Symphony Advanced Media, head of programming Reed says TV Time is providing a consumer service – with its turbocharged TV Guide – something these now-defunct companies did not.
“At the core, we are a TV-tracking service for viewers,” Reed said.
Viewers will find where their programs air, Reed said, and then hopefully add “how the show made them feel.”
