CNN’s ratings plunged in October casting further doubt on their strategy to appeal to the middle of the political spectrum.
The only bright spot in the lineup was Anderson Cooper’s ‘AC360″ which was up +5% in Total Viewers and up +9% in the important A25-54 demographic at 10 PM, and up +26% in Total Viewers and +15% in the demo at 11 PM.
On the other had the much ballyhooed Parker Spitzer was off by 22% in viewers and 10% in the demographic compared to the Campbell Brown show which occupied the time slot last year. What’s even worse is that when the October 13 coverage of the rescue of the final Chilean miner is factored out the numbers change to 34% and 25% respectively.
Parker Spitzer debuted after former CNN president Jon Klein who conceived the show was fired but based on the ratings the network could probably have done better filling the slot with reruns of “Bewitched”.
The ratings slide was felt across the board as American Morning was off by 28% in total viewership, Larry King 26%, The Situation Room was down 16% and John King’;s USA 28%.
Fox News also received some sobering news as they saw their overall audience decline 4% but overall saw flat to small losses plus or minus 2% with their main shows with the exception of Glenn Beck which plunged 24%. Fox is now the #4 cable network.
The big winner in October was MSNBC which has taken a far left turn with a 16% audience gain and watched as their liberal talkers racked up gains between 6-28%.
To me what these numbers say is that CNN’s muddled middle of the road program is a total flop, while viewers at MSNBC were getting nervous about the midterm elections and were looking for any glimmer of hope that they could find. As for Fox’s relatively flat ratings it’s hard to retain momentum when you are the number one cable news network but also the opposite of what MSNBC experienced as the conservative choir didn’t need to listen quite so much as their confidence about the election grew and the sense of urgency except in a few races diminished.
Jautz knew he was stepping into a big problem when he took over CNN but the problems may be far greater than even he expected and probably won’t be solved until he completely overhauls the prime time lineup.
Don Irvine is the chairman of Accuracy in Media and its sister organization Accuracy in Academia. As the son of Reed Irvine, who launched AIM in 1969, he developed an understanding of media bias at an early age, and has been actively involved with AIM for over 30 years.
