NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) is teaming with The Nielsen Company on creating sales metrics across TV and online video streaming. Specifically, the ad sales collaboration will focus on finding the connections between viewers’ buying decisions and habits. Nielsen will provide data from its TV ratings service and its VideoCensus service, which measures streaming video, as well as databases of consumer activity for broader overall product categories, including packaged goods, pharmaceuticals, automotive and movies.

The partnership bridges the paths the two companies have been taking lately to the study of consumer viewing and purchasing habits. Nielsen has been trying to tie together data from TV, the web and mobile, while NBCU has been working with TiVo (NSDQ: TIVO) on mining its audience measurement for ad sales purposes. Release

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