There’s a lot of talk in television these days about mobile, digital, apps, and websites. And with good reason. But for most local TV creative services directors, it’s still about moving the dial, raising the ratings, getting more eyeballs to watch regularly scheduled newscasts on television. For most TV stations, news generates at least half […]
There’s a lot of talk in television these days about mobile, digital, apps, and websites. And with good reason.
But for most local TV creative services directors, it’s still about moving the dial, raising the ratings, getting more eyeballs to watch regularly scheduled newscasts on television.
For most TV stations, news generates at least half of their revenue. So getting more people to watch their 40, 50 or more hours a week of news on TV is still the prize.
With a strong news brand comes all the perks — more digital viewership, more website visits, more Facebook and Twitter followers, more revenue.
So when news ratings increase for any newscast at any station, that’s news worth sharing.
Especially when it’s the result of planning and execution.
WBRE, the Nexstar-owned NBC affiliate in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, Pa., and WYOU, the area’s CBS affiliate operated by Nexstar through a shared services agreement, are experiencing ratings growth.
WBRE’s 6 p.m. newscasts increased 17% in households, from July 2013 to July, 2014.
WYOU’s 6 p.m. newscasts increased 15% in households over the same period.
And according to Rentrak ratings data, Eyewitness News is growing in every day part: morning, noon and night.
So how did this happen?
“It all starts with research,” says Robert Bee, WBRE’s general manager.
And when it comes to the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton market, that’s a big research project, as this market in Northeast Pennsylvania is one of the largest geographic markets in square miles east of the Mississippi. According to Bee, there are 17 daily newspapers published across more than 100 cities and towns in the region.
The research helped the station identify marketing opportunities to exploit.
“The research showed,” says Chris O’Neal, WBRE’s creative services director, “that viewers weren’t as familiar with our talent as they should be.”
Do viewers know who your news personalities are? Could they recognize them and know their names? Does your news anchor or chief meteorologist introduce themselves every time in your daily news topicals?
(To read more about the value of ID/Recognition — the name, the face, the place — click here)
Another finding from the research indicated that viewers wanted more news coverage of their towns, according to Bee. So the station beefed up their coverage across the region, and did an on-air campaign of IDs mentioning all the towns and cities in the region.
In addition to better story-telling, other improvements included a focus on a singular brand, Eyewitness News, an upgrade to high-definition and a new news set.
“Improving our content and on-air presentation as well as identifying with our audience are all key to our plan,” says Bee.
Improving participation for local venues generated 10,000 people at a Wheel of Fortune event, and 50,000 entries for a gas card give-away.
The station followed up the first research project with another one.
“The second project showed that the stations got good grades in all the areas we needed to improve,” says Bee.
And the best grade of all? An Emmy award.
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