The ARF
The ARF is a advertising research association offering membership, events, certification, and licensed data.
The ARF operates in the Agency & Consultancy segment.
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Distinction
The ARF is the Advertising Research Foundation, a nonprofit advertising research and standards body. It is not a demand-side platform, ad network, or commercial SaaS measurement vendor, even though it licenses research data and provides industry analytics resources.
- Founded
- 1936
- Headquarters
- 350 Fifth Avenue, Suite 6705, New York, NY 10118 (located in the Empire State Building)
- Core Segment
- Agency & Consultancy
- Company Size
- 10–49
- Official Links
- Website
- Verified
- 2026-04-23
Key insights about The ARF
The ARF: About
The organisation operates a membership-led research and professional services model. It creates value by convening industry participants, producing and curating research, running practitioner councils, certifying research quality, and commercialising selected proprietary datasets. Revenue is generated through subscriptions and access fees rather than advertising, consumer monetisation, or software usage fees.
Products & Services in Categories
Verified structural categorizations from the graph
The ARF: Market Position
The ARF, legally Advertising Research Foundation Inc, is a US nonprofit industry association focused on advertising research, media measurement, analytics, and professional education. It serves advertisers, agencies, media companies, researchers, and marketing practitioners through a mix of membership access, research distribution, councils, events, certification programmes, and licensed data products such as ARF DASH. Its role is closer to an industry knowledge and standards body than a pure software vendor or consultancy.
The organisation makes money through recurring membership fees, event participation, professional education, certification-related services, and paid licensing of proprietary research assets and datasets. Its customers are business-side industry participants seeking research access, benchmarking, practitioner collaboration, and methodological validation, particularly in media measurement and cross-platform audience analysis.
The ARF: Frequently Asked Questions
What is The ARF?
The ARF is a US nonprofit industry association focused on advertising research, media measurement, professional education, and research standards.
Who uses The ARF?
Advertisers, agencies, media owners, broadcasters, researchers, measurement vendors, academics, and marketing professionals use its membership, events, councils, and data products.
How does The ARF make money?
It earns revenue from memberships, event fees, certification and education programmes, and licensed research products such as ARF DASH.

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