Starting today we are a Nielsen family. For one week we're supposed to log what we watch on every TV including watching the DVD player and DVR. It's kinda interesting and appears to be time consuming. We have to log by increments of 5 minutes.Now, for a normal TV viewer that might not be a problem but I'm a flipper. I hate commercials so I'll flip to another show, get involved and forget to flip back to what I was watching to begin with. What do you say the odds are that I'll remember to log each time I do that? I'm thinking not very good.
To add to the complication factor they only provided us with one log book. We have 4 TVs including the one outside in the 'little house' where DH watches sports and plays pool. Who wants to guess at the probability of him remembering to log whatever he's watching (including channel #, call letters and name of show) when he comes inside. I'm not holding my breath.
I had no idea, but when they mail you the information they also include 5 one dollar bills. I'm not entirely sure why they don't include a check but I'm assuming it has to do with either not wanting to track them or not wanting to deal with people who don't have a bank account so they can cash it. Since I'm the one who will be filling the thing out I claimed the cash :-)
Our log book should be interesting reading. Anyone else ever done this?
Instigator
16 comments:
I've never done it before, and they'd have to pay me more than 5 bucks to do it. :-)
Have fun!
I did it for radio once. They sent me 2 $1 bills. I thought that was kind of odd too, but apparently it's just the way it works. :)
I thought Nielsen had progressed to the point where it was like a DVR and they could remotely monitor your viewing habits if you agreed to be one of their families. Seems to make more sense than asking people to keep logs. Why don't these folks use the technology available to them?
If the cable or satellite company can send a signal to your box from an office in Phoenix, why can't someone collect the shows you watched and analyze it (if you agree)? Weird.
Pretty much ditto Lynn's entire comment.
Except I was only paid $1 for logging my radio habits (hey, this was many moons ago...)
I thought they did have one of those boxes on your TV to record your choices. Maybe this is the prelim stage...Big Brother on your TV comes after they see what you watch...
I've never done it before. And even though it sounds a bit tedious, I think it would be fun. We tend to watch several off the wall shows, so it would be neat to give them a little mention. :)
Angel
I don't think they'd learn much from me other than I'm weird. I don't watch any of the popular shows. I watch a ton off my DVR. Unless they're looking for evidence to start another Law and Order spinoff, I'm no help.
I could've swore they had a box that did all this for you.
I've never done this though I'm not sure $5 would be enough to bother with even the few shows we watch. We TiVo practically everything and then watch and zip through the commercials.
Wonder who'll get voted off Survivor tonight?
PM
Yeah, I thought they had a box too but...apparently not. Or apparently we didn't rank high enough for the box :-) And it's weird that we're doing this from a Thur to a Wed and that they want us to mail the book back immediately.
It's only the first morning and I'm already behind on it. I hope I remember to log the Disney shows the girls watched this morning at 5 AM.
Instigator
I did this over 25 years ago, but it was a lot easier with no cable, just 3 main channels and UHF. It still was a pain in the butt to write everything down and I don't remember getting paid for it.
I did this when I lived in CT. It was a pain. lol!
I've never done this. I used to watch a lot of T.V. but nowadays I'm rarely home or I'm asleep on the couch. Geez! I'd be no help to Nielsen now.
Good luck keeping your log book up to date, Instigator. :-)
I did this last year. I found it to be tedious and would not want to do it again.
I did it when I lived in Atlanta. I had six kids at the time (the boys and my foster children) and all were playing ball. Needless to say, we probably had fewer hours logged than any other family ;)
I did it but it was a long time ago (before computers lol). I did all the logging - husband would never do it - and definitely not for the money lol. I'm sure we didn't have all these channels either and I'm not a flipper so it wasn't too bad. Good luck.
I did the tv one also. THEY DID SEND FIVE ONE DOLLAR BILLS AND WHEN I MAILED MY COMPLETED SURVEY TO THEM THEY SENT A CHECK FOR 600 DOLLARS!!!! I WAS THEN SELECTED TO BE A NIELSEN "FAMILY" AND PAID OVER 1000 DOLLARS PER MONTH FOR A FIVE YEAR CONTRACT, WITH BONUSES OF OVER 2000 PER YEAR!!! VEEEERY WORTHWHILE AS IT WAS TOTALLY PASSIVE INCOME!!
Hey 70 grand for a five year commitment is not as glamorous as it may seem. I completed the five years and bankrolled my 70k. If I had it to do over I would not as it is a very big violation of privacy, (my wife was miserable for the five years because she had to deal with all the nielsen reps who came over at least once every other month for an hour at a time during the day. Better her than me!
I am part of a Nielsen family, my mom was called out of the blue to see if she wanted to participate and of course she did. I am a college student and Nielsen values college students more because of our age ranges. They called me once, talked with me for 5 minutes and then they came and set up a box on mine and my roommates t.v. It didn't take them very long at all, they even bought us dinner!
To use it, I have a remote with numbers 1-6 that correlate with different peoples names. Since there is only three of us in the house...I am number one, my roomate ty is number 2 and lisa is number 3. When I log on, I push my number and then the button "okay" and thats all. If I watch tv for a long time then it will ask me to enter my number again then okay and this will happen a good amount, but it really is not hard at all.
As for being paid, I was given along with my roommates 50$ for the installation and then I was mailed a hundred dollars as a thank you. Every three months, I get anywhere from 150 to 300 dollars.
Many people have posted they have had a really hard time with nielsen, but I on the other hand did not. It is easy and fun. I would tell everyone if you do get asked to be apart of Nielsen do it. Then again it does depend on where you live, the type of technology they use with you and your demographic! Try it out it doesn't hurt and if it does you can always cancel! Hope this helps and the best of luck to new participants of Nielsen!
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