MLBAM Asks Nielsen To Halt Reporting Traffic Numbers

By Eric Fisher, Staff Writer, SportsBusiness Journal

MLBAM Takes Issue With Nielsen's Monthly Traffic Numbers For MLB.com

MLBAM has requested that Nielsen/Net Ratings stop reporting the site’s monthly traffic counts, heightening tensions over the unsettled state of Internet metrics that have built up for more than three years.  In a letter sent late last week to the Internet measurement outfit, MLBAM General Counsel Michael Mellis writes, “Because your reports about MLB.com portal traffic continue to be significantly understated, we continue to be damaged, including without limitation, in our dealings with advertisers ... the better course would be for Nielsen to refrain from issuing traffic information about our portal until it can do so in a reasonably accurate manner.” Nielsen reported MLB.com posted traffic of 12.78 million unique visitors during August '07,  but MLBAM execs say their internal server count points to more than 61 million visitors. MLBAM CEO Bob Bowman: “The differences [in the monthly reports] keep widening, and the problem is only getting worse."  

BACKGROUND: MLBAM first asked Nielsen/Net Ratings to stop reporting MLB.com traffic in April '04, a request that has gone ignored. Bowman’s frustration over Internet metrics was further spiked last week during his appearance at a digital interface event the Walt Disney Co. held in N.Y. for advertisers and marketers. There, several leading buyers and industry execs advocated for panel-based sampling methods, which Nielsen and other many other prominent measurement agencies use, to remain a prominent part of Internet metrics.  Such processes, however, have been widely accused of greatly underrepresenting at-work audiences. Those audiences form a key part of the audiences for many sports sites, including MLB.com. The MLBAM letter in part references a June SportsBusiness Journal report in which Nielsen execs acknowledged some problems with developing a proper sample audience for its at-work Internet use measurement.  Bowman said, “Sampling simply doesn’t work for this, certainly not for our type of site. There’s a reason that politicians and fundraisers don’t call people at work. You’re not going to get a truly honest response. This is no different.”