ABC, CBS Continue Improvement

Latest Weekly Changes in Season to Date ‘07-’08 vs. ‘06-’07

CBS (+0.36%) and ABC (+0.21%) showed gains vs. last season in the most recent week ending May 11. This is the second week in a row that ABC has shown a season over season improvement in viewers in a month. With NBC (-0.07%) slipping a bit,  and likely to slip more as it flags down the stretch, there now seems no chance it will better ABC’s performance vs. last year. CBS’ improvement continues the trend that began when new scripted episodes began appearing in late March.

Fox’s (-0.60%) slide vs. last season continued, but at a somewhat slower pace than recently. The CW numbers were unchanged vs. last season.

Overall Season Total Change in Season to Date ‘07-’08 vs. ‘06-’07

Fox continues as the only network with increased viewership vs. last year. It still looks like Fox will finish the year at about 5% better than last year considering their current rate of decline vs. last season.

All the other broadcast networks continue below last years pace, CBS and CW by significant margins. My guess is that CBS finishes the year more than 15% behind last season. ABC looks headed for a season/season decline of just under 8%. NBC’s continuing gains seem to point them to a season to season decline of about 10%.

A few weeks ago I thought that NBC could close the gap and have a similar year/year performance as ABC, there seems little chance of that now.

The CW, which looks to finish down about 20-25% vs. last year and continues in a funk. At least they won’t have to worry about Sunday next year!

Our chart shows broadcast network primetime season to date average primetime viewership for the 2007-8 season compared to the 2006-7 season on a weekly basis.

Nielsen TV Ratings Data: ©2008 Nielsen Media Research, Inc. All Rights Reserved.