• by Wayne Friedman , May 9, 2014

New York-area cable operator Cablevision Systems Corp. continued to lose ground with its video subscribers, but earned sharply higher advertising revenue for its first-quarter period.

Cable advertising revenue grew 16.8% compared with the prior-year period. While the company did not go into much detail about these results, in an earnings call financial analyst Kristin Aigner Dolan, chief operating officer of Cablevision Systems Corp., said: “Advanced advertising is definitely driving a lot of the improvement that you see, but we don't break it out separately. But I can tell you that in the first quarter, we had more advanced advertising campaigns than we've had since we've launched it 5 years ago, so it's definitely growing.”

First-quarter revenues gained 4.3% to $1.58 billion with net income at $89.7 million solidly reversing a net loss situation in the first quarter of 2013, when it had a loss totaling $16.4 million. Cablevision’s revenue totals beat analysts' projections.

Cablevision said its average monthly cable revenue per customer grew 6% to $148.22, with the average monthly cable revenue per video customer up 8% to $168.34.

Cablevision lost 14,000 video subscribers in the first quarter, to a total 2.799 million. Analysts were expecting losses of 7,700. The company lost 18,000 subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2013.

Voice and high-speed-data customers, however, continue to grow -- each adding 8,000 customers a piece. Cablevision now has 2.788 million broadband customers and 2.280 million voice customers.