Warning: if you don’t love lots and lots of numbers, turn back now! You have been warned…
An astute observer pointed out that in my open letter to Dawn Ostroff I was critical of the CW for reaching a 10% share level in its target demographic of 18-34 year old women, but many shows that are deemed “hit shows” routinely only generate 10% share in the markets those shows go after.
For those who aren’t numbers obsessed “share” represents the percentage of people who were actually watching TV who watched a show. If we say a show had a 10.0/15 (household ratings/share) it means 10% of all households watched that show, and 15% of the people who were watching TV were tuned in. Similarly, if we say a show got 11% (or an 11 share) among 18-49 year old viewers, that means of all the 18-49 year olds who were watching television, 11% of them watched a particular show.
Though there certainly are some instances where shows that are considered “hit shows” do only generate 10% shares among their particular advertising target, there are some shows that perform much better. One thing I realized though is that I’m something of a scale-ist. I appreciate big honking scale, and I suppose of all the “ists” I could be, being a scale-ist isn’t so bad. It is possible that just by my scale-ist nature, I am being unfair to the CW. I suggested that if the CW was only going to target young women, it needed to reach more than 10% of them, perhaps double or as much as 20%. Commenter Holly noted that it seemed like that was a high bar to set. She may well be right and I am thinking about it.
We’ve had the luxury for the last four months or so of actually getting more data on a fairly regular basis. Not regularly enough to feel comfortable about producing some of it regularly here on our site, but it’s still good to have access to. My conversation with the aforementioned astute observer wound up getting me to dig through some of the numbers. After digging through a lot of numbers I wound up asking myself “what’s really a hit?”
I think it’s probably appropriate to take the Einstein view – it’s all relative. Unfortunately, unlike the universe which can always be held relative to the speed of light which is a constant, it’s not so easy with TV networks. In the end, it seems “what is a hit?” is relative to the network itself.
We can imagine, for example that if a show has over 7 million viewers regularly on TNT like The Closer, that it’s a hit. Or if it has over four or five million viewers routinely on USA Network (In Plain Sight, Law & Order: CI, Burn Notice, Monk, and of course WWE Raw) it’s a hit. If AMC’s Mad Men routinely had over two million viewers it would likely be deemed a hit and if any show these days on HBO or Showtime routinely produced over two million viewers in an initial airing, that too would likely be considered a hit.
For purposes of this discussion I’m sticking with scripted shows and ignoring reality shows. I think we’d all agree, whether we like it or not, that American Idol and Dancing with the Stars have been hits. Sunday Night Football is a hit for NBC and Monday Night Football is a hit for ESPN.
We do know that The Office is a Hit for NBC, that House is a hit for fox, that CSI is a hit for CBS and that Grey’s Anatomy is a hit for ABC. And with access to more demographic data we do know for certain that relatively speaking Grey’s Anatomy is the biggest hit of them all.
Please, please understand that the following is not a commentary on the quality of shows, but a look at the ratings. My favorite show of all time is probably still HBO’s The Wire, and that routinely got less than two million viewers. So please don’t take offense! I enjoy The Office, too, which for the typically fourth place peacocks at NBC is definitely a hit, largely on the basis that it has a large concentration of 18-49 year old viewers (typically around 2/3rds of its total viewers) even if total viewership does not have a huge scale. But there is no way to consider The Office the same type of hit that Grey’s Anatomy is. So we probably need some designations like “Hit Shows” and “Mega-hit shows”. By that standard, Grey’s, though down off its highs, is still a megahit.
Looking at some demographic information for its finale last May, Grey’s had 19% of all people who were watching TV, 19% of all 18-49 year olds and a whopping 25% share of all 18-34 year old females watching TV. Sure, that still means 75% of all 18-34 year old females who were watching TV then were watching something else, but 25% share in this day and age, and especially in that demographic is phenomenal. By contrast, CW’s 90210 is getting about 10% of females 18-34. Is it fair to compare Grey’s on ABC to 90210 on CW? No, I don’t think it is. And moreover, I’m rethinking my 20% share target in CW for this demo because I don’t believe it’s possible to achieve those kind of numbers unless you’re generating big numbers all the way around.
For some contrast to the Grey’s numbers, House’s season finale (which was so gut-wrenchingly harsh I don’t believe my friend Bill Gorman could bring himself to fully watch in one sitting, even though House is one of his favorite shows) had 15% of the overall television viewing audience, 14% of the 18-49 viewing audience, and 16% of women 18-34 who were watching TV. These are great numbers just about by any standard, except the Grey’s Anatomy standard. So shortly, when we see the annual Ad Age estimates for 30 second advertising spot costs for broadcast primetime in the 2008-2009 season, when you see that advertising on Grey’s costs quite a bit more than advertising on House, it’s the numbers above that are the reasons why.
Now let’s take a look at CBS’ CSI and the numbers for its finale last May. Going against the season finale of The Office and the penultimate episode of Grey’s Anatomy, CSI had 17% of the overall television viewing audience (and actually eclipsed Grey’s that week which only had 16%). But it underperformed Grey’s in all the “youthful” age/gender demos. CSI had a very healthy and respectable 12% of all 18-49 year olds, but only 7% of the overall 18-34 year olds (the penultimate Grey’s had a 16% share among the aggregate 18-34 demo) and among females 18-34, CSI had an 8% share. The penultimate Grey’s had 22% of the 18-34 year old female viewing population). So while CSI is definitely a hit for CBS, it does illustrate the aging problem – so much so that…
…let’s take a look at the numbers for the season finale of The Office, remembering that it went head-to-head with the finale of CSI and the season’s penultimate episode of Grey’s Anatomy. The Office had but 8% of the total viewing population tuned in (to CSI’s 17% and Grey’s 16%), and among 18-49 year olds The Office had 10% of the viewers, but even with only around only half the total viewers of CSI, among 18-34 year olds, The Office almost doubled CSI 13% to 7%! Among 18-34 year old females, the margin of victory was not as high, but it still beat CSI 12% to 8%. And that’s why The Office, even with about half the total scale of CSI, is a hit.
Any discussion of age and gender demographics requires some disclaiming. While I am an scale-ist, I am not an age-ist and I want to point out that I don’t think that advertisers and the television networks are age-ist for paying premiums for younger viewers. It’s not about ageism, it’s about the way markets work. The availability of viewers 50+ is high. They are much, much easier to reach because they are watching TV much more than 18-34 year olds and 18-49 year olds. It is the market forces of availability that put premiums on the younger viewers. There are fewer of them to be had, so they cost more. That’s just the way markets work.
I hope all the numbers didn’t make your head pop off, but I find it interesting/important to do the relative comparisons as they are more enlightening than merely looking at the aggregate numbers. It does definitely have me rethinking my targets for the CW and I will try to get over being such a scale-ist, because reasonably, whatever you or I may think about the CW’s numbers for Gossip Girl, 90210 and America’s Next Top Model, I’m guessing that regardless of what we think, if they can hold on to even 80% of the numbers they generated the last couple of weeks once they are up against completely new shows across the board in a couple of weeks, the CW will be delighted with the results.
If they can maintain even close to a 10% share of 18-34 year old females with so few total viewers overall (most of the viewers are 18-34 year old females) I think they’ll be happy with the numbers and not care a whit about my love of scale. I know some of you are thinking, “Come on! Once the season starts for everyone else and those shows are going up against new episodes, the 18-34 share will drop to a five!” We’ll soon see, and if it does happen like that I’ll probably write another long open letter to Ms. Ostroff…
Finally, one thing to consider is that our belief mostly has been that while we’re certain the networks do look at how they compare to shows on other networks, when it comes to making renew or cancel decisions, and what Bill G. will use to calculate the “Renew or Cancel Index” the networks mostly compare themselves against themselves and how other shows on their own networks perform.
I think what this comes down to is not whether 90210 or Gossip Girl or America’s Next Top Model are hits for CW. According to CW they are. But what this comes down to is that CW’s hits get half the amount of viewers as WB’s hits did. Can a network really sustain itself when it’s doing so incredibly horrible in comparison to the network that had to merge to avoid folding altogether?
Julia my guess (and it’s just a guess) is that for another year or two it can. If the numbers look like this 2 years from now without any growth from where they are now, I don’t see how it’s possible, but I think if it can show growth, even among 18-34 year old women, it will get some leash from the partners. Of course if MNT comes up fast and passes it before then, all bets are off!
IMO there are tow types of “hit shows”: a general hit show, and a hit show for its network. In the first category i think only the shows that get above 10 million viewers can be named a “hit”. In the second category i agree with mostly everthing you’ve written, although once again i stick to my opinion that there is to much emphesis put on demo numbers.
Bob, since demos are what the advertisers want to pay for, it makes sense that there is emphasis put on them.
But it says a lot about today that 10 mil could be considered the threshold for a hit. It wasn’t very long ago at all that 10 mil was the threshold for renewal.
@Julia that’s my opinion, maybe other think 15 million is the number. But there is a small numbers of shows above 15 million so i lowered my personal bar to 10 million. I think in 5 years even a 7-8 million show will be considered a “general hit”
Regarding the demos, i know how important they are for the networks but when we’re talking about hits i think the vieweing numbers should be the main factor. There’s a difference between a hit and a profitable show. At least that;s my opnion
Some shows are more profitable than others, and that’s a fact. But while there is certainly some correlation between total numbers and success in the demos, it’s the demos that drive profit margins and is why a show like Grey’s Anatomy winds up with more revenue (I can’t speak for profits) than a show like CSI, even though CSI often has more total viewers. Given how the business and markets work, I think it’s very appropriate that there are cases where the demos matter more.
“Unfortunately, unlike the universe which can always be held relative to the speed of light which is a constant….”
Remember, the speed of light is not a fundamental constant. It would not matter, for example, whether its value changed over cosmic timescales. This is different from, say, the fine-structure constant.
And back to the regular programming.
I don’t think it should be underestimated the quality of the individuals who sell the advertising. I remember when AdAge released their ad cost figures, that most of CW’s shows seemed overvalued. Coincidence? No, I think we have to give Ostroff and her team credit for selling their shows.
I’m a Reality TV Producer, and last year I worked on a dismal failure for ABC. Our overall numbers weren’t catastrophic, but we were a big black hole in the younger demo numbers. When our Executive Producer tried to spin the bigger overall ratings to the ABC Exec overseeing the show, the ABC Exec’s response was “Overall numbers are meaningless. I don’t know why anyone bothers printing those ratings anymore. All we care about is The Demo.”
I’m not saying that’s how all executives at all networks feel, I’m just repeating what this guy at ABC told us.
Insider, that’s our understanding as well in terms of a show’s financial success or failure.
However, whenever we have them available, we try and present as many different numbers as we can for comparison.
I think it’s fair to assume that any new show this fall that routinely pulls in an average audience in the region of 10 million viewers will be deemed a hit. When you consider that ABC canned Invasion in 06, a show that pulled in around 10 million viewers a week, yet renewed Pushing Daisies and dirty sexy money in 08, shows that average 8 million viewers a week, there has obviously been a marked change in what is deemed a hit or miss as it were.
Sean, I believe ABC only extended the leash it has to Pushing Daisies and DSM because of the writer’s strike. If those shows and Eli Stone don’t improve over last year’s numbers, I’m guessing they’ll have a fairly short leash.
A fair point, but I think that PD would of been renewed regardless as it’s a critical success with a cult following. It deserves it’s second season renewal. As for DSM and Eli Stone. I think DSM has been a disaster from day 1, with three show runners trying to turn it around. Didn’t they scrap 3 whole episodes recently? Very costly. Eli Stone is a good show, but it just won’t catch on IMO. I’m personally still celebrating the renewal of Boston Legal. Thank God for small miracles. Ha.
Oh don’t misunderstand – I love this site and you should by all means post all the numbers you’ve got. I’m just repeating what this one ABC exec said.
By the way, I’m sure if he was overseeing a show that had huge overall numbers but low demo numbers, he’d be singing a different tune.
Sean, I’m a huge PD fan, and very thankful that it was renewed, but it’s a very costly show to produce as well, and while the Emmys (it already has 2 under its belt!) and critical acclaim may help save it temporarily, ABC isn’t lacking in that department, and looking for any show to give them awards. So, I’m very nervous to see what it debuts to, and will just be counting each episode from here on out as bonuses, unless the numbers tell a very different story than they did last season.
As for Boston Legal, I bet ABC is regretting that decision. The rumors last May were all saying that ABC only picked up Boston Legal because it was part of the deal they cut with David E. Kelley to get him to give them Life on Mars. And then he immediately turned around and quit Life on Mars, which has since gone through a major restructuring. So we’ll see, but I’m betting ABC won’t have a hit on their hands with Life on Mars.
Julia, PD is a great show and lets hope it takes off this fall. I agree, if the numbers don’t improve and the production costs remain the same, cancellation is likely. BL is one of my favorite shows, but it just dosen’t pull in the demo numbers ABC need. It however has numerous Emmy nominations this year, but again I think cost comes into the equation here. A show in it’s 5th year on the air is bound to be expensive to produce. We all tend to forget that TV is a buisness at the end of the day, which is a hard pill to swallow when you see quality TV shows getting the chop due to costs.
Re: Boston Legal, this is purely speculative, but if you take the speculation out of blogging you take well more than 50% of the enjoyment away, too!
I speculate that as much as anything this had to do with syndication. Through the first four seasons there were 88 episodes. I often hear 100 episodes is a magic number for syndication purposes and they are 12 shy. Though Fox is the distributor on the show, I further speculate Fox, Kelley, etc gave ABC some sort of break financially on the costs so that they could get to 100 shows.
Of course it’s also fair to speculate that the chances of part or 100% of this being wrong are at least 50%…
Syndication was a huge part of it as from what I’ve read, ABC have only picked up 13 episodes for season 5 which will bring the show over the 100 episodes needed in order to enter syndication. It’s worth noting that BL has the highest concentration of American’s with incomes in excess of 100,000 dollars annually watching. That’s another good reason it has stayed on the air. Although never a hit in the youth demo’s, the show has faired well in total viewers over the years.
SEASON 1 – 12.5m #27
SEASON 2 – 10.3m #46
SEASON 3 – 9.9m #48
SEASON 4 – 9.8m #51
Sean, the $100K+ income among 18-49 year olds was definitely true for the 2006-2007 season, though I’m not sure that was the case last year or in the years before it. The press release about BL’s performance with wealthy people for 2006-2007 was actually the very thing that put the glimmer in my eye about a void in the blogsphere about TV ratings data, that led to a conversation with Bill about that void, which…led to TVbytheNumbers. So in a very real way, Denny Crane is responsible for TVbytheNumbers!
Denny Crane!
Bill is a *huge* Captain Kirk fan, so it all works out…