Stations Call March Sweeps 'Useless'

Normally the nationwide Nielsen sweeps months are November, February and May. July is also a sweeps month but of lesser importance. This year, due to the expected transition to digital television in February, sweeps was moved to March. That digital transition has been delayed until July for the majority of stations but sweeps plans were already made.

But many stations believe that the March sweeps data will not be as useful to them because you really can't compare this March to previous February data and draw a clear conclusion. Broadcasting & Cable published an interesting article about this today.

“It's just a mess,” says Chuck Larsen, president of October Moon Strategies, a syndication consultancy. “They should have just forgotten winter sweeps. Doing it in March is a waste of time. There will be nothing to compare these ratings to, and ratings in a void are useless.”

“We received a lot of suggestions about February sweeps,” says Nielsen spokesperson Gary Holmes. “In the end, we felt there should be a sweep in the first quarter and that it should not be in February because of issues with the transition. Our feeling was that the industry did not want an information vacuum from November to May,”

Nielsen gathers ratings information in several different ways. Local people meters in the top 10 markets gather the most precise demographic information about what people are watching locally, while people meters across the country acquire national demographic information, such as how CBS Television Distribution's Oprah did among women 18-49 in any given week as well as in households.

Set-top meters in the top 50 markets measure what people are watching, but do not measure demographic information. Markets below the top 50 are measured with diaries only. That's why sweeps remain important in those markets, and why it takes about a month for those measurements to be tallied.

But stations and syndicators have several reasons why it makes little sense to go ahead in March. First, no legitimate comparison is available: February is a darker, colder month, so people tend to watch less TV. And this year, daylight-saving time starts March 8, so even fewer people will be in front of their sets. With no apples-to-apples comparison, sales reps have nothing to match performances up with when they are trying to sell ads.

Moreover, by the time all the data from the March sweeps is collected, it will be time for May sweeps, which will supersede March.

“It's going to be the sweep that never happened,” Larsen says. “Once it's over, no one is going to pay any attention to it.”

The upcoming sweeps dates are as follows:
March: March 5 - April 1, 2009
May: April 23 - May 20, 2009
July: July 2 - July 29, 2009
November: October 29 - November 25, 2009