How Comscore's New CMO Wants to Reshape the Future of Measurement

Tania Yuki didn’t imagine that her role of a disgruntled customer would eventually lead to her becoming CMO of that same company. But that's exactly what happened to Yuki, Comscore’s new CMO, who first joined the company back in 2008, overseeing cross media and video products. “I was recruited into Comscore the first time because I was a really loud and annoying customer who desperately wanted a video-measurement product,” Yuki told Adweek. Yuki then went on to found Shareablee, a social media-focused intelligence platform. In a full-circle event, Comscore acquired the company in December, and Yuki rejoined the Comscore family. She started as CMO on Jan. 10. Comscore Creates Its Own Unified Measurement Offering to Rival Nielsen’s As Comscore’s new CMO—a position that has been vacant since Mark Donovan exited in 2018—Yuki’s big priorities include refreshing the Comscore brand and shaping the future of measurement. “This thing's moving so quickly, marketers are going to need tools to adapt and to try and predict what's coming and try and figure out how to connect as people get much better at avoiding ads and all of that,” said Yuki, pointing to increasing fragmentation, and noting the industry is in “need of an identity.” “There is a school of thought around traditional measurement and what that needs to be and then you've got big data, data science, AI and all of this exciting rule-breaking behavior that changes the game on how we think about measurement and insights,” she said. “I think Comscore is in an exciting spot because we really sit between those two worlds.” According to Yuki, the future of measurement comes with combining traditional measurement as well as future technologies. “We've done all the MRC accreditations and we do all that really heavy lifting as far as rigor, trust and currency,” she said. “But we also have massive gobs of data.” [UPDATE: On Friday, Comscore clarified that it is still pursuing Media Rating Council accreditation for various projects.] For Yuki, that all comes down to measuring people. “[It] sounds very intuitive, but it's actually incredibly hard,” she said. “You really need a company that has great visibility across all these screens, and that can start to piece together what human experience looks like, because if I'm a marketer, I'm trying to figure out how to connect.” Going forward, “I think most of all, I want to make sure that we democratize information. We need to be thinking about ways to free what we know about the consumer and make it easy to use, easy to digest, super actionable,” she added. 'We're at a really exciting inflection point' Yuki’s appointment comes as Comscore's chief rival Nielsen—which spent months facing off with networks over pandemic undercounting—was stripped of its third-party accreditation last year, which has given other measurement firms an opportunity to make inroads. Comscore sees itself leading the pack, looking to position itself as the emerging third-party source for reliable cross-platform measurement. “We're at a really exciting inflection point,” said Yuki. “The last two years has changed the average consumers daily experience in a way that you couldn't have possibly anticipated.” Comscore has been looking to capitalize on the industry’s measurement upheaval by rolling out its own new unified measurement platform—providing a comprehensive and deduplicated cross-platform view of media consumption—that rivals Nielsen’s upcoming Nielsen One offering. Yuki sees a further opportunity for growth in the space, and that involves taking risks. “We also have an opportunity to really help define the future for our customers and for our industry. That's going to involve being a bit unpredictable and doing some unexpected things.” Comscore also recently hired a new chief financial officer, Jon Carpenter, who joined the company in November.