Network audiences are growing–when you factor in the number of people who are time-shifting popular shows in competitive time slots.
The numbers for DVR viewing for the first full week of the fall season came out yesterday and they show some interesting trends for shows.
For the Friday evening series, shows like “Smallville” and “Dollhouse” have made significant strides in viewing figures, often raising their initial ratings by 50%. We’ll have details on what this means to the long-term future of “Dollhouse” on this week’s Slice of SciFi.
According to USA Today, 36 shows added nearly one million viewers when the DVR viewing numbers were factored in. Some of the biggest gains were for some of TVs most popular shows including “Grey’s Anatomy” and “House.” There was also growth for shows in popular time slots like Thursdays at 9 p.m. EST where “Fringe,” “The Office” and “Grey’s” all saw big boosts.
Even NBC’s struggling “Heroes” got a boost of 27% for DVR viewing, but the overall ratings for the show are still well-below those of last year.
Shari Anne Brill, analyst at ad firm Carat USA, says delayed viewing also spiked because, in contrast to last fall’s strike-hobbled start, “there are a lot more new shows bumping up against each other in competitive time periods,” and more of them won recorded tryouts from viewers.
The data “doesn’t radically change perceptions” about borderline series, says Fox scheduling chief Preston Beckman. But “on a night when there’s so much good programming, you want to see if you’re the second choice or the third choice. It helps us to feel comfortable that if we’re patient, we can start to see growth” from same-day viewing.
"It helps us to feel comfortable that if we’re patient, we can start to see growth from same-day viewing."
This shows a severe lack of understanding as to where the industry is headed. I'd say fewer people are making a same day viewing a priority in life. Heroes remains one of my favorite shows on TV and it is a show I watch on Hulu now. Dollhouse I have never watched Friday nights, always on Hulu over the weekend. I watch Stargate Universe on Hulu as well. These aren't "second" or "third" choices, these are just shows that I'm choosing when I watch them instead of letting the network choose for me. And that is becoming the new way to watch TV. I don't think I'm alone in that either. But these are my first tier shows and the way I view isn't going to change just because they really wish I would change it.
Now, if Fox would go back to the reduced number of commercials like they had in season 1 of Dollhouse, life would become satisfactory.
My problem is that most of the really good shows are on Thursday and Friday, and I'm never home on those days, so I *have* to DVR them or miss them entirely. I don't get a chance to watch them until the week-end, so I'm not even counted in the "same-day" viewers. Does that mean my opinion is worth bupkus?
Also, if they're worried about ad revenue, the marketing companies should change their strategy to take advantage of fast-forwarding. When you watch live, the commercials come on and you leave the room to get a soda, grab a snack, or hit the head or something. If you're fast-forwarding, your stuck there watching the screen so you don't go too far. If themarketing companies changed their ads so they took advantage of the fact that the audience is paying more attention when fast-forwarding, things could really start to make progress.
(my own two stupid cents)
Wow. People are recording Friday night programming? I bet that never happened before DVR! [80s-child sarcasm]
I don't know why networks are so shocked by the fact that people record shows to watch at a later time. It's been happening since the invention of the VCR. The fact that they can now account for those viewers via DVR stats should be a positive thing, no? Now if we could just get them to unclench their collective fingers from the antiquated Nielsen system that refuses to acknowledge that large portions of the audience exist...