Viewers Flock To Ad-Supported Cable In Droves During First Half Of November 2004 Sweeps (Primetime Update)

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Viewers Flock To Ad-Supported Cable In Droves During First Half Of November 2004 Sweeps (Primetime Update)

Ad-Supported Cable continues to sizzle this November 2004 sweeps in spite of the cold weather. In the midst of one of Broadcasts’ strongest programming months, viewers continue to flee to Ad-Supported Cable as viewership spikes an amazing 3.3 million P2+ viewers during Primetime for the first two weeks of November 2004 Sweeps period vs. same period a year ago. On the contrary, Broadcast struggles as viewership declines more than a million among P2+ thanks mainly to NBC, PAX, and WB’s poor performance.

Source: CAB analysis of Nielsen. 11/4-11/18/04 vs. 10/30-11/13/03.

With two weeks of sweeps programming under its belt, Broadcast continues to lose steam in Primetime across key targets while Ad-Supported Cable persists to attract viewers across the age spectrum. Ad-Supported Cable strikes a cord as every single demographic experience a significant gain this sweeps period, especially young adults. Cable’s edgy programming lures young adults as Teens and P18-24 demonstrate largest percentage gains to date with viewership up +10.6% and +14.9%, respectively. Broadcast pretty much remains on par among Teens but demonstrates some gains among F18-24 thanks to airings of ABC’s Desperate Housewives and CBS’s CSI -top two rated programs, respectively.

Other Notable Trends:

Ad-Supported Cable is sweeping the competition among children aged 2-11 as viewership surpasses the Broadcast 7 nets by a remarkable 1.8 million viewers. Cable’s healthy yearly Ch2-11 +6.8% gain is driven chiefly by an influx of young boys.

Ad-Supported Cable’s P25-49 considerable gain this sweeps period is driven mainly by a flood of women tuning in to catch their favorite programs. Broadcast is losing ground with M35-49 as viewership is plummeting - down 187,000 viewers from same period a year ago thanks mainly to NBC’s poor performance.

Ad-Supported Cable is experiencing healthy yearly gains among P50+ whereas Broadcast is losing ground with older viewers, especially with F50+ (-9.0%) thanks mainly to CBS’s poor performance.

Source: CAB analysis of Nielsen data. 11/4-11/18/04 vs. 10/30-11/13/03.

As Broadcast continues to erode sweeps after sweeps, year after year – just how low are the ratings levels today. The old days of high rated water cooler programming are long gone as Broadcast has lost its appeal to Ad-Supported Cable’s edgy top notch programming. Today, about 90% of Broadcast’s 7 net programming earns below a 5.0 rating. The high levels which long time ago differentiated Broadcast from Cable are long gone. The chart below details rating classifications across an array of key demographics.

Download November 2004 Sweeps Demo Analysis

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