Google's YouTube will be offering more ad-tracking capabilities for an extended period of time from Nielsen, the television ratings company, deepening the possibility of more ad dollars being siphoned from traditional TV to the massive upstart platform.
Google long held Nielsen at arm's length, keeping third-party measurement of ads running on YouTube at bay, which discouraged some advertisers -- raised on a decades-long reliance on Nielsen ratings for their media buys -- from using the Web's biggest video platform as an outlet for commercials. That changed in November when Google allowed Nielsen to put what are called "online campaign ratings" on some ads.
Tuesday, Nielsen said it has extended this collaboration with Google, with YouTube agreeing to make the online campaign ratings available to some advertisers who buy Google's new preferred video lineups and integrating online campaign ratings with DoubleClick, the online ad firm Google bought in 2007.
By deepening the relationship between the two companies, advertising budgets may see more dollars diverted to the Web's biggest video platform from traditional television and could create opportunities for "YouTube" stars to make more money, easing their access to a bigger pool of advertisers.