Cable's Ratings Are Down, Which Is Why Its Upfront Is Up

I really should have seen this coming, but the cable TV upfront ad sales market is resembling the just-concluded network upfront in one way I hadn't anticipated. Some nets, per Mediapost, are playing the ad inventory scarcity card to get more ad dollars in the door.

In brief, the scarcity card is what you play when your ratings start to go down. It's s a game the broadcast networks have been playing for years, largely by convincing advertisers they need to buy more TV inventory to reach the same number of people they did back when ratings were higher. (God forbid the advertisers should go find those missing viewers where they are, like on YouTube or Facebook.) The reason some high profile cable networks are playing the card now is that, just like their network counterparts, they're beginning to see erosion -- of as much as 11 percent -- in the key 18-49 demo.

The scarcity card seems to be working its magic in cable, just as it has in broadcast. Cable is experiencing CPM increases of as much as ten percent, and may wrap up business taking in upwards of $7.5 billion, a very healthy double-digit increase over last year's recession-battered performance. By that logic, you'd almost think that when TV executives get together in private, they really all pray for no one to watch their shows.

Previous coverage of TV's upfront sales market at BNET Media:

• Other Broadcast Nets to Fox: You Just Ruined It -- I.e., Upfront Ad Sales -- for Everybody!
• Fox, a Poster Boy for Network TV's Irrational Exuberance in the Upfront Market
• Network TV: Where the Money Is, But the Young Viewers Aren't
• CBS' Big Bang Theory: Better to Shake Up the Network Schedule Than Stand Still
• Charlie Sheen's $2M Payday, or Why Much Less Is More in Network TV
• Network TV Upfront: Despite Appearances, Happy Days Aren't Here Again