• by Wayne Friedman , June 7, 2011

"The Voice" has been a surprise hit on NBC, and its affiliates have been benefiting -- especially with late-news programming.

Gannett Broadcasting has done a number of marketing promotions around the show to push viewers to NBC -- all of which has given most of Gannett's six NBC-affiliated stations in the top 25 markets either first or second place in the time period when the show airs.

Plus, late-night -- for virtually all of Gannett's 11 NBC affiliates -- has seen a noticeable improvement in key late-night local programming time periods.

"On the nights where "The Voice" airs, we have been seeing ratings bumps in late news," says Tom Somers, vice president of strategic initiatives for Gannett. "Some stations that don't typically win every night, now win when 'The Voice' airs."

A number of local marketing efforts have helped out. For its St. Louis station, KSDK-TV, viewers were asked on the station's Facebook page to vote for the "coach" of their choice -- if they were a contestant. The page had 37,000 fans at the time.

Gannett's Minneapolis station KARE-TV sponsored its own local singing contest, riffing off of the "The Voice." Viewers upload their singing videos. The station picked the top 11 contestants and had them perform on the station's morning show -- then picked a winner.

In Atlanta, WXIA-TV's morning show interviewed two of the show's judges -- Blake Shelton and Cee Lo Green, who is from Atlanta. Rebecca Loebe, a local "Voice" contestant, performed on WXIA-TV's morning news.

Somers said a key element in pushing "The Voice" was also stations' social-media efforts, especially their respective Facebook pages. NBC also upped its marketing materials to its affiliates -- and more importantly, access to the contestants and judges.

"It makes it easy for stations to want to market it," he said: "It's been a while since we (NBC stations and affiliates) had a show that we could get excited about."