Despite this year's move of the February book to March in anticipation of the switch to all digital broadcasting, WKYC wound up the month with a strong showing, particularly in the most important age demographics.
As you know, the transition date for most stations moved to June 12th, but Nielsen went ahead with their original March book plans as scheduled.
Stations were previously interested in claiming victory based on Households (HHs) before Local People Meters (LPMs) came to Cleveland last August. This was mainly because Nielsen took several weeks after the actual sweeps period ended to release the break down of individual demographics. Stations were quick to use the total amount of people watching to begin selling their next quarters. Now, the demographic breakdown occurs instantly and continuously. And stations have a much clearer, daily picture of how their products are attracting the coveted "money demo" audiences.
Those keys to success are measured by the amount of viewers a station delivers to most advertisers in the following age demographics: Adults 25 to 54, Women 25 to 54, Men 25 to 54 and Adults 18 to 49. Households are no longer as important.
WKYC did extremely well in March. In fact, the station was number 1 at both 6 & 11 p.m. in A25-54, W25-54 and A18-49. This was very encouraging news for a station that has had to make changes due to economic conditions and NBCs failure to deliever stronger programming in Prime Time (8 to 11 p.m.) over the past few years.
Plus, the March book gave us a clear reading on our decision to have a solo anchor, Romona Robinson, at the helm of our main broadcasts. As we have discussed before, this new format relies more on anchor/reporter interaction and spends more time examining the stories we report on.
We'll call that experiment a success so far.
WKYC News Director Rita Andolsen tells the Director's Cut blog, "This is the first ratings period since we debuted our single anchor format and I am thrilled we passed with flying colors at 6 & 11 p.m. Romona's anchoring and years of experience, coupled with a strong on-air team and producers who understand how to produce a single anchor newscast are all keys to our success."
In addition, NBC's late night programming was also particularly strong in March as Jimmy Fallon succeeded Conan O'Brien on "Late Night." And "The Tonight Show" saw some of its highest ratings thanks to an appearance to President Obama.
Although, we are now on a 12 month ratings cycle, the next major ratings period will be April 23rd through May 20th - still lovelingly referred to as "May Sweeps."
