Nielsen Rolls Out 200+ Advanced Segments to Defend Its Ratings Throne

Nielsen is rolling out more than 200 new advanced audience segments on its Nielsen ONE platform, a major play to give marketers sharper targeting tools in an ad market obsessed with outcomes.

• Beyond demographics: The new segments, powered by Nielsen’s Scarborough division, allow advertisers to target viewers based on specific behaviors—like "heavy social media users" or "frequent food delivery service users"—instead of just age and gender. The data for these profiles comes from annual surveys of more than 300,000 U.S. adults and covers major categories like automotive, retail, and lifestyle.

• Outcomes over eyeballs: The pivot is a direct response to the industry's obsession with "outcomes-driven" campaigns. Marketers no longer just want to know how many people saw their ad; they want to know if the right people saw it and if it led to a sale. This expansion is Nielsen's strategic answer to the industry’s urgent demand for addressability and interoperability at scale.

The promise is simple: cut down on wasted ad spending and help marketers prove their return on investment. For now, the segments are available for campaign planning, but Nielsen says it will add hundreds more and make them fully shoppable for ad buys in the second quarter.