Media terms

Media terms

The jargon of the media industry is complex and you can quickly lose track of it. We have summarized and defined general and TV-specific terms in a glossary for you.

General
TV

Affinity
A metric for how effectively a medium is able to reach a particular target group. Ratio of the target group reach to that of the sampled universe (average = 100).

Average opportunity to see / to hear (OTS/OTH)
The Avg OTS of a media plan is arrived at by dividing the gross reach by the net reach.

CATI
Computer-assisted telephone interview.

CAWI
Computer assisted web interview.

Cost per thousand impressions/readers (CPM/TCP)
Cost for 1,000 impressions/readers based on the actual advertising costs (advertising costs / readers or impressions × 1000).

Cross media
Cross media is a multi-channel marketing strategy in which content is developed for and distributed ­across different media channels in order to maximise advertising effectiveness.

Demographic characteristics
Description of population characteristics, usually of a social or economic nature, such as gender, age, income, etc.

Double reader
Reader of a print medium who also ­reads another title.

External overlap
The overlap between two or more different media.

Gross reach
The sum of all of the audiences or potential audiences exposed to a medium.

Intermedia comparison
A comparison of the performance of different media genres with respect to coverage, communication, technical and economic criteria.

Internal overlap
The readership overlap ­across several issues of a title.

Intramedia comparison
Comparison of the performance ­of advertising media of the same type in terms of reach, exposures, costs, etc.

Media selection
The process of choosing advertising media with the aid of ­computer analysis. – Evaluation Measuring the effectiveness of media plans – Ranking Measurement of the effectiveness of advertising vehicles

Projection
Reach in absolute figures. Extrapolation from sample values to the sampled universe.

Reach (net)
The number of individuals reached by a medium at least once during a specific period of time.

Representativeness
How characteristic the random sample ­is of the universe from which it is taken.

Sample
A subset of the population or universe.

Structure
Breakdown of a universe into subgroups, e.g. the ­total population by age group.

Target audience
A group of people defined in terms of their demographic, consumer and attitudinal characteristics.

Universe
The total number of persons from which the sample is pulled.