Paige Albiniak of
Broadcasting & Cable has written yet another new
article about daytime which slams soaps. She's already declaring that they have "gone away." Here are a few excerpts from the latest doom and gloom article. It's mostly about what programming will take the place of soaps.
As soap operas fade into extinction, syndication’s female-friendly shows are more sought-after by advertisers than ever.
“We saw a bit of a shift in this year’s upfront because there was such a dearth of ratings points in traditional daytime,” says Judy Kenny, executive VP of sales at Twentieth Television. “Advertisers were really searching for female vehicles and buying shows that they don’t typically buy. The soap operas have gone away, so packaged goods and female-targeted brands have massive needs in that daypart. Syndication in general had great demand in daytime properties.”
In general, sitcoms are a good place to find both young women and men, comprising two highly desirable and tough-to-reach TV audiences. “If an advertiser wants to target young women 18-34, the first place you look is sitcoms,” says Mitch Burg, president of the Syndicated Network Television Association.
As Bill Carroll, VP of programming for Katz Television Group Programming, explains: “Younger viewers tend to be looking for an escape, while older viewers are looking for information.”
Everyone of these articles completely overlooks the fact that a daytime soap could be produced cheaply and actually be forward thinking, diverse and interesting. The assumption is that fans have lost interest in daytime soaps. All we know for sure is many have lost interest in bad daytime soaps. GREY'S ANATOMY, DESPERATE HOUSEWIVES and GLEE were three of the top-rated shows on television last week, all soaps. The appetite for good serialized storytelling actually seems to be growing not declining.
This is a quote from a seller of syndicated programming. It serves their purpose to claim soaps are dead...as that leads to more sales for them.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if there is validity to the claim that younger adults like sitcoms (that's probably what this person is selling) and older adults like information? I'd like to see the survey that showed that.
Mark, one more piece of info from the article.
ReplyDeleteThe top four syndicated strips for women 18-34 are sitcoms: Twentieth’s Family Guy and NBCU’s The Office tie for first, followed by Two and a Half Men and Warner Bros.’ Friends. Oprah is fifth among that age group. As women get older, they watch less of these sorts of shows.