While a program is being broadcast, Medianalyst can provide a real-time, continuous (second by second) demonstration of its strong and weak points as determined by a selection of one to nine targets. Whatever the age range of the audience, from young children to adults, the ease of use of the cordless voting units with a cursor enables the participants to express their opinions instantly and anonymously, without taking time to reflect on them. Medianalyst acts as a means for revealing an audience's spontaneous level of appreciation.

During a Medianalyst session, the significant variations in the appreciation curves are noted for use as input for discussion in analysis focus groups. General questionnaires on the program can also be submitted to the same sample group, relating to their comprehension, their opinion of the program host or cast, their appreciation of the stage, their intention to watch the program when faced with competing offers, and so on.

At the end of the session, the participants use their voting devices to give their overall appreciation of the program. The responses permit identification of groups of people having a moderate opinion, i.e, neither too positive nor too negative, who will be invited to take part in the focus groups.

The duration of the focus groups is quite short (about one and a half hours) as the candidates need no preliminary preparation and most of the strong and weak points of the program are already identified. The focus groups are used to confront the audience with their overall opinions and to find explanations to the variations in opinion (dislike of certain actors or program hosts, reactions to certain remarks or situations, incomprehension, boredom, etc).

In a continuous appreciation test, a typical question asked to the audience might be of the form:
• Do you like it ?
• Do you dislike it ?