Legends of Media Research

An interview with Julya Fridman, where she discusses a range of initiatives across her career, including her early engagement with cross-platform measurement at A+E (and her quest for finding common metrics and developing a methodology for aggregating 100+ unique data sources), her pioneering research utilizing biometric measurement and, ultimately, her transition to big data analytics / data science at Charter Communications.

An interview with Steve Schlesinger, Executive Chairman of Sago.  In this interview, we walk through Steve's career building his research empire - initially as Schlesinger Group (a business his mom started back in their home in 1966) which grew to a truly global enterprise. We explore the story of how the company grew, how it weathered adversity, and what all this means for the future of media and marketing research.   It's an interview you won't want to miss.

Dr. Radha Subramanyam shares stories from across her career as a media researcher, initially in TV, then in new media, and finally back in TV again.  The episode is packed with great career advice in how to best integrate research into creative; bring data analytics and traditional consumer insights together; and how to best triangulate truth.  Radha's story is also a great celebration of the benefits of blending academic and industry arenas, highlighting how her academic roots shape her industry practice today.

Join us as we explore the career of Howard Shimmel across his years at Nielsen, MTV Networks, Simmons Research, AOL/Time Warner, Nielsen (again) and Turner Broadcasting.  Howard shares stories about how he tackled subscription pricing research for AOL/Time Warner, children's research at Nickelodeon and new ad format research for Turner.  It's an episode packed with life lessons.

Rick Mandler shares stories from across his career, exploring the launch of digital at ABC, the 'enhanced TV' era of 'two-screen' TV (where viewers used their thin Internet services to interact from their laptops while watching TV), the ABC Media Player, Disney Lab studies, and his new initiatives at Comcast including Freewheel's new Viewer Experience Lab.

Come and listen as Dr. Horst Stipp shares adventures from his 40 years at NBC and over the past 11 years at the ARF.  The episode includes great stories from the pilot testing for Seinfield, numerous social effects studies (including on television violence and copycat suicide risks), Olympics research, NeuroStandards and, of course, the ARF's current 'attention validation' initiative.  There's an adventure at every turn!  It's another episode you won't want to miss.

Gian is, without a doubt, the most decorated of our Legends of Media Research to date, having been awarded just about every marketing research and entrepreneur award under the sun! And his impact on our industry has been massive - particularly with the introduction of purchase scanning data in the 1980s, while he served as CEO of IRI, and internet usage data in the late 1990's where he was CEO/co-founder of Comscore. Hear the background stories to how both sets of measures came to market - and so much more.  It's an episode you won't want to miss.

Barry is perhaps the best story-teller in our industry.  His presentations weave a narrative that take you on an emotional journey as you discover insights along the way.  Come discover the secrets of Barry's craft - and discovery key strategies for delivering bad news.  It's an episode packed with insights that will help elevate your own presentation skills - so it's an episode you won't want to miss.

Join Nathalie's journey leading teams from Dow Jones (Wall Street Journal) to ESPN to CBS Interactive to the ANA and now in her new role as Chief Research & Analytics Officer at Yahoo.  Nathalie shares amazing insights around the challenges of cross-platform measurement, viewability, integrating data science and consumer insights and so much more.  An episode you won't want to miss!

Unique among our Legends, Andrea's career has crossed back and forth between leading sales teams and research teams across a career that has seen her leadership across ESPN, Vevo, Comcast Spotlight (now Effectv) and now Warner Bros Discovery.  Andrea shares many of the secrets she has discovered in her truly adventurous career.