Commentary

Two Million Viewers Doesn't Mean Cable TV Advertising Success

by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, April 8, 2011

Two point two million viewers and you can't get any advertising support? Is that what happen to Glenn Beck? Three years and out?

It sure seemed Beck had the perfect and complete backing of Roger Ailes, chairman of Fox News Channel. Yeah, we know about scores of advertisers who abandoned the show. But we know they all didn't leave the network.

In an increasingly micro-targeted media world, Beck's show was immensely big -- many times the size of other cable TV news shows. It would seem that in a fractionalized media world, all kinds of niche content can survive. Digital video business seemingly can work with fewer visitors. But with Beck, we now know traditional media rules sometimes do apply.

"Fox saw that he was bad for business," said David Brock, founder/CEO of Media Matters of America, on MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews."

Some reports say some 300 to 400 advertisers were lost on Beck's show. But that's over-reaching. Few news reports know the exact media planning/buying moves of each TV marketer's media plan on the Fox News Channel. Typically, those TV advertisers are in variety of different Fox News shows -- a run-of-schedule plan that doesn't put the same advertisers into the same shows every day. Two million viewers is a big number -- more than virtually all cable news shows. But remember, two million viewers amount to less than 1% of all U.S. TV viewers. For cable TV however - afternoon cable TV, for that matter -- it's big, though tiny for many broadcast networks/distributors.

Beck had has success doing a number of digital video offerings -- where fans could go and pay for his content. Along with his radio show -- maybe a satellite radio show -- perhaps this is the way to go for the future. For many in the increasing fractional media world, this is the right plan -- get consumers to pay where advertisers won't or can't.

One would think in a world where the likes of Google seem to promise traditional TV/cable networks new kinds of video advertisers for their hard-to-sell programming, Fox News could have figured out another financial formula.

All to say, while we see many TV/video advertising financial connections changing, much remains the same no matter the relative popularity scale when it comes to one's point of view.

television, tv

2 comments about "Two Million Viewers Doesn't Mean Cable TV Advertising Success".

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Douglas Ferguson from College of Charleston, April 8, 2011 at 5:54 p.m.
This country was founded on the idea of a free flow of information. Citizens hear all sides and choose the preferred viewpoint for themselves. How quaint. Now if you dislike one of the voices, you boycott its funding and starve it silent. It's the new American way.
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Brian Hayashi from ConnectMe 360, April 8, 2011 at 6:09 p.m.

If Glenn Beck stays his current course of teleconferenced town halls, IMO Beck will become a cautionary tale. Fractionalized audiences mean there is greater value in a platform that delivers continuity. While he will be no doubt successful in the short term, it will be a much harder slog to maintain that following given the fickle ebbs and flows of popular opinion on either side of the aisle.

Now, if he can use his platform to create a portfolio of perspectives instead of a cult of a single personality, each new voice representing a significant viewpoint in the cultural zeitgeist, Glenn Beck the platform might have a chance to find its legs.