ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, May 3, 1996 TAG: 9605030033
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: CODY LOWE STAFF WRITER
"A 'household' never bought a washing machine," Jerry Heilman, former general manager of WSET-TV (Channel 13) insists.
So, there's not much use comparing television stations' ratings numbers that are calculated on "household" viewing patterns, he says.
When stations sell time to advertisers, they tend to break out ratings for specific parts of their audience - women ages 25-54, or persons 35 and older.
Stations nearly always can find a demographic group for which they are the most popular choice during any given time of day.
But to compare the public's overall viewing habits, it has become standard to look at household viewing.
The chart on page 1 breaks down some of the ratings numbers for the area's four largest commercial stations. The numbers are based on diaries sent to viewers in the Roanoke-Lynchburg "designated market area."
Though the stations themselves would rarely use these numbers - except for bragging rights - they are one way to compare the relative popularity of the programs they show. (National household figures, for instance, are used in the weekly charts of the "top 10" broadcast network programs.)
The chart includes two sets of numbers for each part of the day.
On the left of a program's name is its "rating." That is the percentage of all 400,000 households in the market that have their television sets tuned to the program at a particular time. Not everyone's TV is turned on all the time, though, so television marketers also want to know their "share" of the audience who do have their sets on - the second number on the chart.
Stations will compare their share ratings not only to each other, but to previous ratings periods to check on trends.
For instance, a show that is "trending up" - increasing share points over a period of time - might be kept on the schedule even though its performance is not as good as the station had hoped.
Randy Smith, general manager of WSLS-TV (Channel 10), said there was some disappointment with the performance of "Day and Date," for instance. But because its share has increased over time, the station will stick with the show.
Smith also has found "Day and Date" to be more "advertiser friendly" than "Ricki Lake," the talk show it replaced. The sometimes-controversial content of Lake's show made some advertisers shy away from it.
On the other hand, Channel 13's Heilman says he's been pleased with Lake since she has been airing on his station this season.
The time a show is aired is often determined by contractual obligations.
At WDBJ, programmers were unable last fall to schedule two syndicated programs - "Seinfeld" and "Home Improvement" - back-to-back in a bid to draw a younger audience to its prime-time access hour from 7 until 8 p.m.
Contracts for "Wheel of Fortune" dictated that it run between 7 and 8 p.m. So, the station opted to run "Home Improvement" and "Jeopardy" between 4 and 5 p.m.; and "Wheel of Fortune" and "Seinfeld" between 7 and 8 p.m.
Next fall, the station will pair the two comedies at 7 p.m., while the game shows will be moving to WSET - which plans to air them together starting at 7 p.m.
If keeping up with the swapping of syndicated shows among the stations seems tough, consider what their programmers have to go through to stay abreast of new shows and their competition - on cable and satellite as well as the other broadcast stations.
The weekly numbers also show that almost a quarter of the households in which the television is on are tuned to the VCR, laser-disc player, video games or a channel with an audience too small to measure.
Even with all the numbers, the sophisticated breakdowns, and complex comparisons, interpretation still is up to the individual stations.
"We look at the book as more of a barometer of our overall direction," Smith said
"If we show an increase, we can conclude our overall efforts are good. For a particular program, we can evaluate whether or not it works, whether is needs better promotion, or, if it's locally produced, whether there are improvements we need to make."
LENGTH: Medium: 80 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Ratings boosters (clockwise from left): 1.by CNBNBC'stop-rated "E.R." Thursdays on Channel 10, 2. Channel 7's news
at 6 and 11 p.m., 3. syndicated "Home Improvement" after noons on
Channel 7. 4. Fox's "X-Files" Thursdays on Channel 21/27. (NOTE:
"X-Files" runs on Fridays).