Every vendor deck in this industry has the same slide. A logo, three letters, and a sentence with no object in it. We're MRC accredited. Accredited for what, nobody says, because the sentence works better when nobody asks.

Here is what the Media Rating Council told ADOTAT in writing this week: MRC does not accredit companies. It does not accredit services as a whole. It does not accredit methods. What it accredits is a reported metric, for a specific environment, on specific devices, in specific media and formats, inside a specific service, in a specific geography. Everything narrower than that sentence is real. Everything broader than it is marketing.

So the claim is not a lie you catch. It is a scope you make them say out loud, in the room, while they are still selling you. The vendor who did the work will answer in under two minutes and enjoy it. The vendor renting a logo will reach for "holistic" and "the spirit of."

Below this line: the five questions, in order, with what a clean answer sounds like and what the dodge sounds like, plus the one sentence you put in the follow-up email that settles it. Field Kit members also get the one-page card, sourced and printable, built to go into the meeting with you.

The Field Kit is the Thursday tool for ADOTAT+ members. One thing a week you can actually use on the next call, built off reporting we already paid for.

Read what the sales deck is the least-policed surface in the entire measurement system, and why nobody is coming to fix that but you.