An advertiser-focused group has launched a global initiative to make the advertiser voice heard on the topic of cross-media measurement, said a statement of the group.

The ‘Cross Media Working Group’ is the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) and key advertisers from WFA’s Global Media Board including EA, Mastercard, P&G and Unilever.

The group said in a statement to the press that they aim to find cross-industry consensus on key global principles for measurement, with broadcasters, digital platforms and measurement companies also involved in the initiative.

“Meaningful cross-audience measurement represents a step-change for marketers in understanding the impact of their marketing investment. But with great promise comes great complexity so there are many challenges to work through. Our first goal is to identify the global principles that can help accelerate the adoption of cross-media measurement, enabling more individual markets to adapt a common platform while also reflecting local market custom and practice,” said Stephan Loerke, CEO, WFA in a statement to the press.

According to the group, there are four key areas where more work and consultation is required to build consensus: privacy, measurement infrastructure or pipework, metrics and date and lastly, governance.

In terms of privacy, the group aims to ensure that the data provided respects consumer privacy and is in line with the existing and emerging privacy regulation. For measurement infrastructure or ‘pipework’, the group said in the statement that “measurement requires a complex infrastructure of components and data. Decisions are required as to how best to connect these, for example, the role for TV panels, calibration with other sources as well as the method of audience de-duplication.”

The group added that the cross-media measurement requires consistent definitions and metrics to enable like-for-like comparisons between media. Nonetheless, they added in the statement, a clear governance in order to protect privacy and ensure objectivity and enable fair decision making.

The statement added that this collaborative project aims to build principles, “built on agreement and commitment from the industry, which can become the foundations for potential solutions.”