I guarantee, if they hired Melissa Theuriau, I'd watch every night.
Posted on 04/17/2008 9:50:15 AM PDT by abb
So just how badly is Katie Couric doing ratings-wise, anyhow?
That seems to be the big question following word last week that the “CBS Evening News” anchor would be eased out following the presidential election.
The answer is pretty bad.
Couric has seen viewer declines in just about every category except for median age, where “Evening News” has grown slightly older. That’s the one place CBS wasn’t looking to rise.
While ABC and NBC have seen modest declines this year among total viewers and adults 25-54, Couric is down by double digits in each, after seeing double-digit declines last year as well.
Season to date, according to Nielsen, Couric is averaging 6.61 million total viewers. That's off 10 percent from last year and well behind first-place NBC at 8.96 million, which is off just 1 percent from last year. ABC is at 8.75 million, down 1 percent as well.
These latter declines represent that natural attrition of nightly news audiences. Couric's indicate a flight of viewers.
In adults 25-54s the story looks worse. She’s down 12 percent versus last year, to a 2.09 rating, while leader ABC is down 4 percent to 2.71 and second-place NBC has slipped 5 percent, to 2.69.
This was the audience Couric excelled with as co-host of "Today" on NBC for years.
Last week, when Wall Street Journal and Washington Post stories predicting her departure broke, Couric’s ratings fell to their lowest level in weeks, just 160,000 above her previous record low.
She averaged 5.56 million total viewers and a 1.4 25-54 rating, a distant third place. To be fair, ABC and NBC were also down from their season averages.
ABC’s “World News with Charles Gibson” placed first among total viewers, averaging 8.03 million, and 25-54s, with a 2.0 average rating. NBC’s “Nightly News with Brian Williams” was second in viewers, averaging 7.92 million, and 25-54s, with a 1.9 rating.
During her 19 months on the job, Couric established record-low ratings for the newscast multiple times, the most recent last September, when she broadcast from Syria and Iraq to mark her first anniversary on the job.
She averaged a mere 5.4 million total viewers that week, the lowest for the broadcast since people meters were put in use 21 years ago, and less than half of what she pulled in her first night on the job a year earlier, when she bowed with 13.1 million.
The 51-year-old Couric has also had a difficult time wooing younger viewers. She was hired in part to attract women and young people, those who’ve long since abandoned the nightly network news.
But in 2007, Couric’s median viewer age was 61, a half-year higher than the previous year, when then-anchors Bob Schieffer and Dan Rather, ages 71 and 76, had a median age of 60.5. That was also CBS’s second-oldest median in five years, according to data from the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
Couric was, however, younger than her two rival newscasts, which were both at about 61.5 last year.
Meanwhile, in other dayparts for the week ended April 6, NBC’s “Meet the Press” was first among the Sunday morning shows in total viewers with 3.48 million tuning in and among viewers 25-54 with a 1.0 rating. ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos” was second in viewers with 2.8 million and tied for second among 25-54s with a 0.8, with CBS’s “Face the Nation” pulling 2.78 million viewers and a 0.8 among 25-54s. “Fox News Sunday” averaged 1.42 million viewers and a 0.5 rating among 25-54s.
In late night, NBC’s “Tonight Show with Jay Leno” finished first for the week, averaging 5.1 million total viewers and a 1.4 rating among adults 18-49. CBS’s “The Late Show with David Letterman” had 4 million viewers and a 1.2 rating in the demo, with ABC’s “Nightline” bringing in 3.2 million viewers and a 1.0 18-49 rating. In late-late night, CBS’s “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson” had 1.9 million total viewers and a 0.6 in 18-49s, with NBC’s “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” at 1.8 million viewers and a 0.7, ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live” at 1.7 million viewers and a 0.6, and NBC’s “Last Call with Carson Daly” bringing in 1 million viewers and a 0.4 among 18-49s.
In morning shows, NBC’s “Today” was first yet again with 5.63 million total viewers and a 4.3 household rating and 15 share, followed by ABC’s “Good Morning America” with 4.44 million viewers and a 3.4/12. CBS’s “Early Show” was third with 2.84 million total viewers and a 2.2/8.
CBS once again had the largest full daytime audience during the week, averaging 3.73 million viewers, but was tied for second among women 18-49 with a 1.3 rating. NBC had the second-largest audience, averaging 2.82 million viewers, and was first among women 18-49 with a 1.5 rating. ABC had a full daytime audience of 2.67 million and was tied for second among women 18-49 with a 1.3 rating.
ping
http://news.bostonherald.com/business/media/view.bg?articleid=1087720&srvc=home&position=recent
Was prime-time right time?
Brokaw warned Couric of move
By Jessica Heslam / MediaBiz | Thursday, April 17, 2008 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Media & Marketing
One of the most-watched newsmen of our time warned Katie Couric that it wouldn’t be easy when she traded her popular, perky role on the “Today” show for the more serious “CBS Evening News.”
“I told her when she left that it’s a dive off the high board,” Tom Brokaw told MediaBiz this week during a visit to Boston. “This is harder than it looks, to go from the morning to the evening.”
And Brokaw should know.
He, too, was a host on NBC’s “Today” show before he began anchoring the Peacock Network’s “Nightly News” solo in 1983, a post he held for more than two decades.
“I think that they made a number of mistakes in terms of how they marketed her and what their approach to the news was,” Brokaw added. “But the last thing I’m going to do is get involved in Katie’s business.”
Brokaw was years into his anchoring career before he owned the top ratings spot, stealing it from longtime front-runner ABC’s “World News Tonight with Peter Jennings.” Brokaw was No. 1 from 1997 until his 2004 departure.
While Couric was a ratings success in the morning, her newscast has lagged in third place after 19 months on the job.
Couric reportedly could be calling it quits before her $15-million-a-year contract is up in 2011.
snip
Couric could have done a lot better had she stuck to reporting the news instead of using it as a public forum for her anti-Conservative, anti-Republican viewpoints.
And this time, we're talking Cinemax.
For Katie C why should she stress about ratings. She rakes in millions for being a talking prompter reading new head.
If CBS gives her the ax she can go elsewhere and do just fine. I don’t watch any TV news except in fleeting moments or significant events.
If CBS wanted to have a female anchor for ratings, they should have hired Laurie Dhue or Kiran Chetry away from Fox. Instead, they put that old plucked hen Katie in there instead.
And Dan Rather must be spinning in his grave.
Oh, wait...
What is more shocking is that 6 million tune in to listen to Katie Couric.
I guarantee, if they hired Melissa Theuriau, I'd watch every night.
5.6, 4.4, 2.8 million viewers? Am I crazy or aren’t there about 300 million people in this country?
Is this just a reflection of Nielson participants? All the people I know watch television a lot. I may be advertising my stupidity but I don’t get this.
100% Melissa dittos!!!
If CBS wanted to have a female anchor for ratings, they should have hired Laurie Dhue or Kiran Chetry away from Fox. Instead, they put that old plucked hen Katie in there instead. 
All the networks are slowly dying, but the data shows that Couric is sinking much faster than her competitors. So she indeed carries a lot of blame. As much as I want to see all these "news" shows gone tomorrow, a deficit of 2 million viewers vs. her competition is a lot of money in lost ad revenue and will continue to be so for the next few years until these shows are pulled.
I just read SO Cal ratings she getting kill by Quantum Leap reruns and TMZ TV show
Katie is doing just fine. She can cry all the way to the bank after a pitifull performance that was handsomely rewarded. In contrast Sean McManus and Les Moonves are apparently living in a parallel universe where throwing money at garbage is an olympic sport.
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