ITV should consider moving the BGT lives shows to 7-9pm, with new dramas at 9pm and soaps ditched for a week. Of course wouldn't happen - precious bloody soaps, and I doubt ITV will have five new dramas all year, never mind in the Spring.

Similarly moving I'm a Celeb to 8pm would provide a lead in to the 9pm hour which could be maximised - doesn't even have to be every day, just to launch a couple of new shows (like C4 have done with BB, which was a hugely successful strategy when people actually watched BB!).


Saturday night is out of the question IMO after The X Factor - drama has never really worked well for ITV there, and it goes against the whole idea of trying to make Saturdays a bit different. Sunday though is a definate giving a leg-up to a new drama rather than existing.


As for Christmas Day - wouldn't work for ITV, but could for BBC. Watching the Glee sneak peak on E4 last night I was thinking that sort of strategy would work really well with a premiere on Christmas Day - but it's got to be the right programme.

I dont really agree. You main programme should be the centre piece of the schedule. Viewers dont like being told to watch stuff so the lead in value is over rated. It works IF and ONLY IF viewers actually want to watch the following show.

The best thing ITV did this year was to route TXF is the key 8pm slot for almost all its run.

Even with brilliant promotion, good clips, etc. I don't think a show like Glee would have mainstream success on ITV. The only way I reckon it would get good ratings would be by being on after X Factor/BGT. Otherwise, I think it'd get around 4m which probably isn't good enough.


You're right that BH was isolated, but even with a great lead in of 9m for the F1 it got a little over 4m. I just don't think there's an appetite for this sort of show on either BBC1 or ITV1.


In the case of Downton Abbey, I think a Corrie lead in would be as effective as X Factor but Sunday really is the sort of day which DA will be on. Mondays are reserved for crime drama, Thursday's the Bill and Friday's not a good day. So a Corrie lead-in is pretty much out of question unless ITV moves Corrie back to Sundays which is unlikely to happen.

I agree that Married, Single, Other would be a good choice as the post-X Factor drama, but it seems that ITV are going to air it this Spring.

Hard to say really. It'd probably need an XF lead-in to begin with, granted, but I think it would have the ability to hold on to an audience. It's not like Moving Wallpaper which only had a very limited appeal.

Now that DS has closed the previous Ratings Thread, this won't automatically link. The below refers to a discussion about ITV2's Sunday share on Sunday 6th December:

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/s...postcount=3984


http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/s...postcount=3986


Looking at BARB today:

16:49 - Harry Hill's The Best of TV Burp: 0.679m
17:17 - FILM: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: 1.073m
18:03 - FILM: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: 1.713m
20:29 - The Xtra Factor: 2.018m
21:34 - Dannii Minogue Uncut: Piers Morgan's Life Stories: 0.695m

Some very good figures there - I suspect the rest of the day (with the exception of Grimefighters) had about ~400,000.

If I ruled the ITV world, a couple of ideas I'd include:

1 Have a consistent schedule for each "season" (moving stuff around always causes problems for shows).
2 Recommission new programmes that receive some critical acclaim, even if they don't set the ratings world alight straight away. And make sure that the catchup services work and aren't annoying! (e.g. for the first couple of episodes of a new programme, don't show any ads on the catchup service). They could also use narrative repeats to help people "catch on" to something new they may have missed when first broadcast (I know this is going back a while, but the first ever DoctorWho episode was shown on consecutive weeks because "world events" meant many people missed it at first!).

K

Wild at Heart starts Sunday 10th January at 20:30 on ITV1.

Presumably the meat in the DoI sandwich.

There it is. The snow I predicted a week or so ago. Now looks likely to be a south-east only event with heavy snow forecast even for the capital. Whether it will cause as much disruption as the 2nd February remains to be seen, but I would favour somewhere in Kent for the biggest dumping going by the latest charts with a front stalling over the south-east. North and west of Cambridgeshire it will be mostly dry with isolated flurries at times but bonechillingly cold.

I doubt it will boost Thursday night's TV much. It will more likely have an effect on Friday with several inches of snow likely to have accumulated in parts and the snow continuing to fall in parts of Kent, coupled with bitterly cold temperatures.

---
Dan
Christmas Ratings Predictions
Snow Watch 2009/10

At Least with BBC1 at xmas there's something for everyone.
Soap,Drama,Film,Music,Comedy,reality show.

ITV's 'BIG WEEKEND' had all the same shows
Reality/Entertainment shows all had something todo with The X Factor/Simon cowell even the comedy awards had to mention the XF.

It was obvious XF would do well as yet again Simon cowell continues the same rubbish'Ill drop XF from ITV ect'
and gets the front page of all the papers.

BBC xmas will do well on merit i think where as the big weekend was the usual Cowell pr

Just a quick question. Is is cheaper to make a drama in the UK (and build sets) or to fly British actors out the USA and build sets there (no one would see any difference)?

Yeah everyone just watched because Cowell told them to.

NO it's Just been everywhere.Heart radio had ads every 10mins most of last week,Plus the adverts on ITV and the front page on most of the papers thats why it got a good rating

The way i see it is if you don't like reality shows then sat/sun night on ITV were a total turn-off
whereas BBC's xmas it has something for everyone.

ITV had so many trailers 'Who are you backing'
throughout most of their shows on a sat and sun so people that don't normally watch might have wanted to see the final.

What's your point?

Lots of people watched it because lots of people wanted to watch it?

The programming on BBC this Christmas is superb. As you say there is such a range of shows and genres that there is something for everyone. I wouldnt blame ITV for making last weekend just an X Factor weekend as they are simply giving viewers what they want. But, when people say that one show is better than all of the BBC shows this Christmas then that is stupid.

my point is with it being all over the papers,radio,Tv ect people that dont normally watch might have just to see what the fuss is about.
We had this convo at work too
A few people had said they watched the final on Sunday just to see what the big fuss was about.

Doesnt that just prove that all the advertising and promotion was worth it if people were tuning in just to see what the fuss was about.

Its not one month since the BBC devoted a 7 hour slot of programming to an all singing, all dancing telethon.

The fact it got 10m stands as no lesser achievement though and its certainly not to see that it didnt get it on merit.

That not the same
CIN has been going for 30 years and its 7 hours for charity.

Id like to see XF or any other reality show reach 30.
BB for example ratings were high and it's now been axed as figures has got so poor
People will get bored sometime

Yea but then how many people liked what they saw?
Im not a big XF fan tbh i can't stand the show
but my family like it and enjoy it but even they said what rubbish and that it was predictable.

I know there are people that were happy with it and people that hated who won.

Looking at this years download only sales so far
Joe has managed 77,000 copies(Up untill yesterday)

yet the last 2 winners had both sold over 100,000 downloads in the same amount of time
so that says to me some people were not happy with the winner

Regardless of who won the fact is most people who watched it enjoy the show. I watched it, like I did most weeks, thought it was a ropey, padded 2 hour show but like most who watched will be back again next year.

Have you got AIs to support this claim?

Personally, I thought it was a brilliant final. You didnt even have to buy in to the whole X Factor chebang to enjoy it. There were elements to it such as Sir Paul McCartney's performance that any Tom, Dick or Harry could have engaged with.

The Jedward 'appearance check' appears to be heading to the recording of the Ant and Dec Christmas Show tonight: http://twitter.com/planetjedward

Followed by Graham Norton on 31st December and then a famous house on 3rd January. I'll be interested to see CBB's launch ratings IF they go in...

Looking at BARB figures for week ending 6th December some interesting m/c figures. Spooks first look got 0.72m and its early morning repeat got 0.7m on BBC3. Life got 0.7m for BBC4 on Tuesday. Xtra Factor got over 2m on Sunday and Lewis managed between 0.79 and 1.02m viewers for ITV3 between Monday and Friday.

Nobody said that.

Somebody said Christmas Day's ratings on BBC One were more impressive than The X Factor's finale audience. I disagree. It's a difference of opinion. It's not reflective of the quality of the schedule.

TBH I think BBC1 Christmas Day and ITV1 The Big Weekend were impressive for different reason.

BBC1 draw up a schedule each year which draws in the family viewer. OK, I say that they could air the testcard and still get viewers - but if I'm honest they place together a schedule which compliments brilliantly. ITV1 air Emmerdale, Coronation Street and, in past years, the likes of Doc Martin, Dancing on Ice and Midsomer Murders. On any other night that'd do brilliantly against BBC1, but because BBC1 get to combine the weekday and weekend schedules they mould something together to suit everyone.

ITV1's Big Weekend benefited from a superb marketing campaign, and again complimentary programme. By using Cheryl Cole and Susan Boyle alongside the regular Harry Hill hour they knew the audience would be there and utilised the fact to pull in good figures.

So for me, both impressive, both through simple yet affective scheduling. Why the hell they can't do it for the other 363/364 days of the year...