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Edited Date/Time
7/3/2013 11:04pm
I saw these stats posted at the bottom of this JGR Southwick PR
Attendance at last week’s Budd’s Creek pro national was 21,600. There were 60,698 live stream stats. The first motos aired live on Fuel TV with viewership of 29,000, the second 450 moto was live on NBC with 432,000 watching.
That is the first time i have seen hard #'s of the TV viewing audience. For NBC to bring in almost 500k, that is doing pretty damn good in my book.
I remember when the Ultimate Fighter series started and the UFC/Dana White were pretty stoked to hit almost half a mill....and it was a huge milestone when they broke their 1st million. (they have now far surpassed those humblers) but i was just using that as a reference.
So, what say you? (and yes i am prepared for the onslaught of differing opinions, some good, and some probably not so good lol)
Attendance at last week’s Budd’s Creek pro national was 21,600. There were 60,698 live stream stats. The first motos aired live on Fuel TV with viewership of 29,000, the second 450 moto was live on NBC with 432,000 watching.
That is the first time i have seen hard #'s of the TV viewing audience. For NBC to bring in almost 500k, that is doing pretty damn good in my book.
I remember when the Ultimate Fighter series started and the UFC/Dana White were pretty stoked to hit almost half a mill....and it was a huge milestone when they broke their 1st million. (they have now far surpassed those humblers) but i was just using that as a reference.
So, what say you? (and yes i am prepared for the onslaught of differing opinions, some good, and some probably not so good lol)
500k for a national broadcast is a pretty small number.
The Shop
The NBC broadcast had 14.89 X the amount of viewership than the Fuel broadcast? That is incredible to say the least. I knew it would be more....but almost 15 X more? Almost a 1/2 a million people tuned in to watch those moto's.....which is pretty awesome I think. I myself enjoy the fuel broadcast a lot more , but I wonder if the viewing is a lot lower just because some people don't pay as much attention to that channel or they simply just don't get it?
I think the stream would have a lot more viewers if we(without NBC) had the option to see both motos.
Now i dont watch the stream anymore since its to hard to only see one moto then wait for 24h.
I could have watched it on the big screen, been at home in the ac, and texted back and forth with my other kid in Florida, all for free. I will still probably watch it on tv when I can.
And I could have even bitched about the tv coverage on vital while I was watching it too.
Syndication is where you go market by market and sign the best deal you can with a local network affiliate or independent station for the best time period you can get. Out of 212 television markets in the US, Your New House normally aired in 150 to 160 markets each weekend. Time periods were from 5 am to 3 pm Saturday or Sunday, depending on the station. We averaged 1,000,000 households per weekend broadcast.
For cable, we had a three year deal with Discovery Channel to air Monday through Friday at 6 pm EST. Those broadcasts averaged about 350,000 households.
Being on a cable network is great, being on a broadcast network is huge. Advertisers and sponsors are looking for the most viewers possible when they are preparing to cut a check. Sales are about a funnel, you start with the largest number of potential customers possible and your sales are some percentage of that number. Bigger is better.
We have it on at our dealership and at least 10-20 people are there watching the race.
The coverage we see in the MX Nationals really dilutes and flattens the tracks down. The big hill at Millville looks almost like a gentle slope on TV and whoops look like a small bumps. If a casual viewer didn't know any different they might not think MX took place on very extreme terrain and the riders certainly wouldn't need to be all that fit to ride it. Which is a shame and couldn't be further from the truth.
Be cool to see some super slow mo footage ln MX like the MotoGP broadcasts are showing.
How do the broadcasters know how many viewers are watching? How accurate can those numbers really be? I can see the streaming numbers being very accurate; the others I'm not so sure of.
Bigger TV ratings means an outside sponsor, like Rockstar Energy Drink, will spend more money supporting a team. Thanks to Rockstar, Ryan Sipes, Davi Millsaps, Nico Izzi, Blake Wharton and Jason Anderson make a salary to race professionally in this sport. More ratings equals more sponsorship money which means more money for them. Nearly every team out there has an outside sponsor now--if Monster wasn't impressed with TV ratings, maybe Pro Circuit goes from its current seven-rider lineup to four. Maybe GEICO cuts its funding and Wil Hahn is out of a job. Maybe RAM doesn't back RCH Suzuki, and Broc Tickle is out of work. Maybe Discount Tire doesn't back Chad Reed. Maybe N-FAB doesn't support its team, and Nicoletti and Blose go without rides. You can go on forever with this equation. Remember, back in the 1980s when the sport didn't have this kind of exposure, there were probably 8-10 good paying rides total in the entire paddock. Now there's probably triple that. It's not a coincidence. No doubt sponsors are thrilled to get 500,000 on network TV compared 29,000 on FUEL TV, and that sponsor money works its way into riders pockets, and prevents them from becoming privateers. Think about it.
Pit Row
Do you just have to click to the channel, or watch it for a minimum amount of time?
Does it count if a DVR records it?
By the way, one thing that really helps live sports these days is the DVR. There's much less time shifting in a live sporting event than a TV pre-recorded TV show, and advertisers and networks are obviously scared that everyone forwards through the commercials during the pre recorded stuff. It's not as likely in a live sports game or race, although obviously some people still do it. But if you're a network trying to sell commercials people will actually watch, live sports are better, and that's why you're seeing such a huge push toward live sports coverage. That's why you're suddenly seeing NBC Sports Net, Fox Sports 1(coming soon) and a CBS Sports Network on cable, where those channels didn't even exist in the days before the DVR. Live TV is more important than ever--so sports and live "results based" shows like American Idol are the ideal fodder for TV channels in the DVR era.
It is not an accurate system. But the companies Weege listed live and die by those numbers. They will take their money and go elsewhere if the numbers are low. Everyone wants the riders to make more money. Television makes that possible.
I always wondered that. Now I know.
1. Overnight ratings. Electronic boxes that are attached to all the televisions in a Nielsen families home. They monitor everything watched in the home and send the info direct to Nielsen. Not sure of the numbers now, but it used to be 12,500 monitored homes spread over the largest 65 television markets in the US.
2. Weekly ratings. Diaries are mailed to 5,000 homes each week, spread over all 212 television markets. The family or individual has to fill them out, and then mail them back to Nielsen.
The problem is these numbers don't usually match. I was at a TV convention and my Nielsen rep came up and said "Congrats, you pulled a 1.4 this week in the overnights." Great, my highest rating ever. Then the weekly ratings came out on Thursday and it said we got a .8 for the same weekend. Crap. At that time, there were about 100,000,000 households with TV's. So either 1,400,000 homes were tuned in, or 800,000 homes were tuned in. I found my Nielsen rep and asked which number is correct, and she said both. I argued that 12,500 electronic boxes in 65 markets were more accurate then 5,000 handwritten diaries spread over 212 markets. Nielsen says nope, both numbers are correct. Not a perfect system.
Lot's of people are riding/racing on Sat and not watching TV....I would also say those guys are supporting the sport too.
I think people see MX on TV and think it growing or more popular, I think it hides the fact there are less participants, low bike sales etc.. There is some cool racing shots on TV (between commercials), but to be honest when RV checks out, how much of a race was that...credit to him
having said that, TV doesn't hurt the sport...if viewers keep increasing it means someone is making more money
In my opinion, MX/SX racing is at a tipping point - it's either going to finally benefit from all the radical changes that have been made to the sport with the intention of reaching the mainstream, or it's going to fall flat on it's face and take a few steps back. What I find frustrating, solely as a fan, is that the action is there. If NASCAR and PGA Golf (I LOVE golf, but not everyone wants to sit down and watch it, same as MX) can get such high ratings, so can motocross. It's exciting, brutal, the racing is usually pretty good. I just wish they would treat it more seriously, like an F1 race or an NFL game, rather than a commercial for the sport. Let the racing action sell itself.
The bigger question is: how popular and mainstream do we want MX to get?
Other than for people who make their living off of the sport TV is a net loss. That is the reason outside sponsors are brought in. The industry cant support itself so it has to turn to outside sponsors who believe the "show" will bring non participants to the couch who might catch an ad and choose to go buy an energy drink or 10.
I think the appropriate phrase here is "be careful what you wish for". Ask the surfers how they feel about the growth of their sport.
For MX, appealing to the "casual viewer" is a bit of a unicorn chase. TPTB in American moto would be wise not to base any of their decision making too heavily on that particular demographic. Supposing that Charlie Channelsurfer actually does happen upon the TV broadcast, what are the odds he stays tuned to endure the frequent, repetitive commercial breaks...or the ad content very thinly masquerading as "features" (I'm looking at you, animated Kawasaki track map before every single moto)? I can barely stomach it myself, and I have been a motocross fan my entire life.
I prefer the MX-Life subscription/PPV format. I know all the arguments against it, and it may not be perfect, but it is a lot less commercialized, and can be watched at any time, at any place that has an internet connection.
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