IRS 2017 to be released next week

The Readership Studies Council of India (RSCI), formed jointly by the Media Research Users Council (MRUC), and the Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC), announces that the IRS 2017 will be released in the 3rd week of January 2018.

 

In a departure from the past, the IRS 2017 is a full year report covering four quarters of fieldwork.

 

A media statement states that "the IRS Techcom, RSCI, MRUC along with the Nielsen team have left no stone unturned in their endeavour to provide the industry with a reliable and robust study. The team focussed on enhanced levels of scrutiny adopted via frequent field visits, backchecks, use of GPS tracking devices, audio recordings, and quarterly validations".

 

It added that there was also an encouraging response from media agency personnel who took part in field backchecks and accompaniments. Data validation for all the four fieldwork quarters for IRS 2017 was successfully completed last month.

 

Ashish Bhasin, Chairman, MRUC and chairman and CEO – South Asia, Dentsu Aegis Network, said, “The absence of IRS data in the past three years or so has impacted our industry in many ways. It was difficult for the agencies to plan without the availability of a comprehensive and reliable study, which provides valuable information on product ownership, demographics, and media consumption habits, across markets. Advertisers and Publishers, in particular, relied heavily on intuition and market perception, leading to loss of opportunity in maximising profitability. We are delighted that the IRS is back and we expect that this will set a new standard for Print Research globally.”

 

Pratap Pawar, vice chairman, MRUC and chairman, Sakal Media Group, added, “The print industry has been eagerly awaiting the release of IRS. Going forward MRUC and the IRS would continue to deliver the best and tread on higher paths of glory.”

 

Shashi Sinha, RSCI mancom chairman, and CEO, IPG Mediabrands, stated, “There is no other readership study in the world other than the IRS that caters to a complex and diverse market like India with a sample as large as 3 lakhs plus households, and with a methodology designed to deliver gold standard research. I believe the RSCI Techcom and the MRUC has put in a lot of effort to perfect the upcoming Report, making it future-ready and synonymous with the market truths.”

 

NP Sathyamurthy, chairman – RSCI Technical Committee and executive director, DDB Mudra Group, observed, “After months and months of dedication, we have come out with a product that we believe is truly world-class. The IRS has constantly innovated with new technology led solutions to improve veracity of data capture quarter-on-quarter, and the sheer focus on data scrutiny which we deployed makes us believe that the new improved IRS would reap rich dividends for the industry stakeholders.”