In August, videos at JohnMcCain.com attracted more female than male viewers for the first time, Nielsen Online reported Wednesday.
Women accounted for 58% of all unique video viewers on John McCain’s website last month — up from July and June, when they made up 48% and 37% of unique video viewers on the site.
The increase in women video viewers at JohnMcCain.com came during the same month that McCain selected Sarah Palin as his vice presidential running mate.
Barack Obama’s website drew consistently large percentages of women video viewers during the summer months, …

Voters not yet committed to either candidate were 12% more engaged by TV coverage of the GOP convention than the Democratic convention, according to an analysis released Monday by Nielsen IAG.
“Engagement” refers to the amount of attention paid to a television program by the average viewer.  Nielsen measures TV engagement by questioning a representative panel of viewers about their recall of specific telecasts’ content.
John McCain’s acceptance speech on September 4 drew the most attentive audience of uncommitted viewers, Nielsen reported.  Telecasts of Barack Obama’s and Sarah Palin’s acceptance speeches on …

Vice-presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin may be in the headlines, but the chatter in the blogosphere remains focused on the presidential candidates, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain, according to Nielsen Online.
Online Buzz
An analysis by Nielsen of the online discussions around more than 30 speakers at the Democratic and Republican conventions showed Obama leading McCain, followed by Palin and Sen. Hillary Clinton.  Vice-presidential candidate, Sen. Joe Biden, rounded out the top five most buzzworthy politicians.

Rank
Speaker
Index

1
Barack Obama
100

2
John McCain
97

3
Sarah Palin
80

4
Hillary Clinton
33

5
Joe Biden
26

6
George W. Bush
12

7
Michelle Obama
12

8
Bill Clinton
11

9
Cindy McCain
5

10
Ted Kennedy
5

11
Nancy Pelosi
4

12
Mitt Romney
4

13
Al Gore
4

14
Joe Lieberman
4

15
Rudy Giuliani
3

16
Fred Thompson
3

17
Mike …

On Thursday night, John McCain’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention bested Barack Obama’s record-breaking viewership numbers from last week by 500,000 viewers.
More than 38.9 million people tuned in to coverage of the final night of the GOP convention.  In comparison, Obama’s acceptance speech at the Democratic convention drew 38.4 million viewers.
For the third night in a row, more women (19.2 million) than men (17.9 million) watched the RNC coverage.  Still, McCain’s speech drew significantly more men than Obama’s acceptance speech (16.2 million).  In contrast, Obama drew more women (19.9 …

For their respective nomination speeches at the conventions, Senator Barack Obama drew 38.3 million TV viewers compared to 37.2 million for Governor Sarah Palin. Tracking buzz via Nielsen Online the day after each speech, Obama again showed an edge with mentions in nearly 3.5% of all blog posts on August 29, compared to Palin’s peak of just north of 2.5% of all posts the day after her highly anticipated debut on the national stage. As reported previously, Palin’s announcement buzz overshadowed that of her rival Joe Biden as well as …

Senators McCain and Obama spent about the same on Olympics TV advertising — between $5 and $6 million, Adweek reported Monday.
But McCain got much more bang for his advertising bucks, according to an analysis by Nielsen IAG.
Nielsen’s survey of 1,600 likely general election voters who watched the Beijing Games found that McCain’s Olympic ads more effectively communicated a basic message, were recalled by more viewers, and triggered a larger intent-to-vote increase among viewers than ads run by Obama’s campaign. 
On average, the two McCain ads that were surveyed — “Celebrity” and “Washington’s …

ABC’s primetime coverage of the final day of the Democratic National Convention led in viewership drawing an average audience of roughly 6.6 million viewers. The event featured the widely viewed acceptance speech by Sen. Barack Obama.
Convention coverage from NBC and CBS also made their way into the top 10.

RANK
NAME
NETWORK
VIEWERS (P2+)

1
VOTE2008:DEM NAT CONV-THU(S)-08/28/2008
ABC
6,584,000

2
DECISION ‘08 DEM CONV THU(S)-08/28/2008
NBC
6,100,000

3
BIG BROTHER 10-THU
CBS
5,969,000

4
CSI
CBS
5,297,000

5
MOMENT OF TRUTH 8/28-9P(S)-08/28/2008
FOX
5,179,000

6
AL DIABLO CON GUAPOS THU
UNI
5,127,000

7
CAMPAIGN 2008-DEM CONV-TH(S)-08/28/2008
CBS
4,722,000

8
FUEGO EN LA SANGRE THU
UNI
4,685,000

9
GREY’S ANATOMY-THU 9PM
ABC
4,008,000

10
MOMENT OF TRUTH 8/28-8P(S)-08/28/2008
FOX
3,690,000

Source: The Nielsen Company (August 28, 2008)

Overall, NBC won the night with an average audience …

Day four of the Democratic National Convention featured the acceptance speech by nominee Sen. Barack Obama.  The convention was carried live during prime time on ten networks – ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, FOX News Channel, MSNBC, BET, TV One, Univision and Telemundo.  Coverage varied by network, all ten aired live coverage from approximately 10-11PM (ET). The final night drew the largest audience so far for the Democrats (24.5% of all American homes), eclipsing the audience reach the three previous evenings.

The speech by Sen. Obama was the fifth most-viewed, non-sports program …

More than 24 million people watched the third night of the 2008 Democratic National Convention — a 7.5% decrease from 26 million viewers on day two of the convention.
Wednesday night’s speeches, which featured Former President Bill Clinton’s endorsement of Senator Obama and Senator Joseph Biden’s acceptance of his party’s nomination for vice president, drew 12.2% of all African American viewers — down slightly from the prevous night when Hillary Clinton addressed the convention (12.7%), but up from day one (12%), when Michelle Obama spoke.
Viewers age 55 and older continue to dominate …

With the national political conventions starting next week, pundits and the general public, alike, are scrutinizing Barack Obama’s and John McCain’s campaign strategies.
On Thursday, Nielsen joined the fray, releasing an analysis of the candidates’ online presence and buzz, their advertising campaigns, and TV viewership for past conventions. 
Online Audience and Videos Viewed
BarackObama.com’s unique audience was twice as large as JohnMcCain.com’s in both June and July 2008.  However, in July, the number of video streams on JohnMcCain.com more than doubled, possibly due to press coverage around Senator John McCain’s ad that compared …