• by Wayne Friedman , June 6, 2011

Now, as the last broadcast network NBC is nearing completion of its upfront deals, many are describing this year's big TV ad sales period as a "strong" market -- despite what some have perceived as lower-than-expected price increases.

This year's upfront TV market is pegging programs at an average 9% to 12% price increases for CPMs -- higher than the 6% to 8% gains of a year ago.

"It's not tremendously strong, but it's far from weak," says Gary Carr, senior vice president and executive director of national broadcast for media agency TargetCast tcm. "It's averaging mid- to-upper-single-digit to low double-digit increases. Money is up; but ratings are fragmented."

Executives are guessing the broadcast prime-time part of the upfront could add around 5% in total dollars to around $9.3 billion, with cable networks' upfront, for all dayparts, adding 10% to 11% in total volume to $9.0 billion.

Many networks were expecting booming gains this upfront period -- anywhere from 15% to 20% price hikes. Much of this was estimated from early and crazy-strong scatter pricing in fourth-quarter 2010 and early in the first-quarter 2011, which rose 30% to 40% over last year's upfront market.

But Carr says most of this roaring scatter activity quieted substantially after February of this year, with networks getting more modest 10% to 15% increases.

Scatter pricing -- mostly in the second quarter -- is usually a good predictor of the upfront. CBS was the only broadcast network with any appreciable inventory to make significant dollar gains for most of the scatter selling periods.

NBC has completed two-thirds of its upfront inventory selling, at around 9% gains in CPMs, per media executives. An NBC spokeswoman had no comment.

NBC upfront deals are a percentage point or two under the price hikes of Fox, ABC and CW, which closed much of their respective upfront business last week. Media executives says many advertisers' cable and syndication TV budgets have been registered, but not much in the way of deals have been inked so far.