Wonderful analysis. First I have read that really explains Fox's dominance.
In Depth: Can CNN retake the lead from FOX?
Inside Cable News blog
Ever since CNN lost the Cable News lead in the ratings to FOX News Channel, the network has gone through a succession of overhauls and makeovers (along with several network Presidents) in an attempt at regaining that lead. The latest “makeover” has been in progress since Jonathan Klein took over running CNN. While the overhaul is still a work in progress and more time is needed before the new format can be fully realized, enough has happened to see the direction CNN is going in.
Inside Politics, Crossfire, and Capital Gang have been jettisoned and the void created by those departures has been filled by The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer. Anderson Cooper 360 has been beefed up with a group of dedicated correspondents like Rick Sanchez and Heidi Collins. After being repeatedly battered by FOX’s Saturday business block, CNN has gotten rid of most of its business programming on Saturdays. In its place for the moment will be a return to hard news programming. Paula Zahn Now is rumored to be next on the makeover stage.
The term “flooding the zone” was first used late last year but it is a process that CNN has stuck with since then. Put as many resources on a story as possible to get all the angles. Of the three networks CNN far and away has the most resources at its disposal and the theory goes that the most resources should yield the best coverage. But “theory” is the operative word there. For CNN the results have been mixed. On Hurricane Dennis, CNN’s big resources were a definite advantage. But on other stories, particularly those with pool feeds like the ceremony for Pope Bennedict the XVI, the playing field was leveled and having lots of resources wasn’t necessarily a slam dunk advantage.
CNN’s fundamental problem is that it is no longer perceived as the go to network for news. That title has been taken away by FOX. The numbers don’t lie. More people tune in to FOX first for a story before they tune in to CNN. With the recent announcement of John Roberts’ nomination as Supreme Court Justice, more viewers tuned in to FOX first. And they stayed there. CNN’s numbers for that big news event were lower than they were for a normal news day a year ago. That’s a big problem.
Politics has been one of FOX’s strong suits for years now. The FOX detractors will point to a Republican administration and say dismissively that it’s just Republicans tuning in to a Republican channel to watch Republican news. There may be a tinge of truth to that but it is also true that FOX has carved out a niche in political matters and other stories that CNN and other mainstream news channels have largely ignored. The fact is there is an audience for those stories. Whether the stories are relevant or not or the right issues that should concern news networks is largely based on where your political and moral affiliations lie. But the numbers show there is an audience. And it’s an audience that CNN is so far not trying to tap in to to any great extent. And therein lies the problem for CNN as ICN sees it.
Let’s go back 8 years to July of 1997 for a guide to the dynamic that has taken place here and the problem CNN faces.
(The first number is the July 97 monthy number. The second number is the July 05 monthly number. The number in parentheses it the percentage change from 97 to 05)
Total Day P2+
FOX 15,000\986,000 (+6473%)
CNN 408,000\435,000 (+7%)
MSNBC 48,000\200,000 (+317%)
CNBC 171,000\131,000 (-23%)
HLN 204,000\240,000 (+18%)
Prime Time
FOX 24,000\1,913,000 (+7871%)
CNN 869,000\713,000 (-18%)
MSNBC 67,000\280,000 (+318%)
CNBC 290,000\115,000 (-60%)
HLN 254,000\413,000 (+63%)
The numbers show a couple of fascinating points. First of all CNN hasn’t lost that many viewers to FOX in the last eight years. In fact it has grown its share in daytime, though not by leaps and bounds. Second, and more ominous for CNN, FOX has skyrocketed to the top by bringing in viewers who weren’t watching eight years ago. So this is the crux of the problem for CNN; in the last eight years it lost stature and dominance to FOX News not by screwing up and turning away viewers but by failing to attract new viewers. Whereas FOX brought viewers in by shaping its coverage to a demographic that back in 98 wasn’t interested in cable news. CNN’s challenge therefore is not trying to recapture viewers it lost but to capture viewers it never had to begin with.
All of CNN’s reshuffling has been mostly structural and not philisophical. It is akin to re-modelling the furniture on the train to attract more passengers while not addressing the fact more people now prefer to fly to get to their destination. The idea that renewed focus on delivering the news faster and with more angles is negated if the news is not of interest to people to make them switch away from FOX, people who came to FOX in the first place from outside the viewing audience of 1998. On some stories, like the Hurrican Dennis coverage, structural refocussing paid off somewhat because CNN’s huge resources compared to FOX’s resources on the story caused viewers to change channels when the hurricane hit landfall, though not enough to win the coverage outright. In ICN’s opinion, a clear satellite picture in a storm beats a crummy video phone picture any day of the week. But Hurricanes are pure life and death stories, lacking in any sort of political or moral overtones. Whereas a majority of day to day news stories do have those overtones. And as long as CNN doesn’t address that side of the equation in its coverage and change the perception that FOX is the sole provider of that kind of coverage, the best CNN can hope for is to periodically come close to catching FOX in the ratings on but not pass it.
There are two options for CNN. The first is to continue the way they are going. But then they need to stop trying to compare themselves to FOX and trying to take FOX down in the ratings. Because it simply can’t be done. FOX is too far in front sustained by a viewership not interested in what CNN has to offer. CNN’s direction is currently not FOX’s direction. Both are news organizations but they approach the news fundamentally differently. CNN takes on more of an international outlook with what I consider overall to be an unbiased eye. CNN’s detractors sometimes call it an Anti-American channel but I think that’s mostly hogwash. There is a portion of America that follows the “America First” rule of news. It’s steeped in Nationalism and pride for America. I make no judgements on whether that is a good or a bad thing. It’s just a different way of looking at the world than those who think things are too interconnected to the point that being America First can sometimes be counterproductive. And it is in many ways in conflict with CNN’s approach to news. These people who tune in to do so because FOX doesn’t share the same outlook on news as CNN (or MSNBC to a lesser extent). FOX makes no apologies in providing news about Americans for Americans. I’m not going to comment about the scope of FOX’s news coverage other than to say that it’s obvious that there is a market out there for it. And judging by the numbers it’s a bigger audience than what CNN currently programs to.
The other option is for CNN to alter its focus. In ICN’s opinion FOX does have an achilles heel in its organization. While FOX can concentrate the resources it has on targeted coverage of events that are planned in advance like The Iraq War and American political events like campaign coverage and elections and do so very well, on short notice events that require instant deployment of resources FOX’s comparatively smaller resources and infrastructure prove to be something of a liability. CNN, with its vast resources, out-muscled FOX on the death of John Paul 2 (though even CNN was out-muscled by NBC/MSNBC in the first 24 hours) and CNN out muscled FOX on Hurricane Dennis. But, and this is key, the fact that they out muscled them was negated by the fact that the viewers who tune in to FOX first (and in numbers greater than those who tune in to CNN first) do so because they perceive FOX to be the news channel that speaks to them better than any other channel. And as long as that perception exists, CNN will have a near impossible task of wooing those viewers over to them. So if CNN wants to compete with FOX and get the lead back in the ratings it needs to start paying attention to the “America First” crowd because there is apparently no other untapped audience out there to get viewers from. If there was CNN should have been able to tap into it and enjoy the rise in viewership that both FOX and MSNBC (in MSNBC’s case; to an exponentially lesser externt) did in the last seven years
ICN thinks that, in theory anyways, it can be done but it would be very tricky for CNN in its current form to do it. CNN would need to maintain its international presence and strong news gathering operation but also turn inwards to the Heartland of America (a strong FOX constituency) but do so in a way that viewers won’t think they are being patronized. Viewers are smart. They know what’s real and what isn’t. This is something MSNBC never understood when Erik Sorenson was in charge three years ago and MSNBC flailed about in a vain attempt to steal viewers from FOX by rebranding itself as “America’s News Channel” and putting on right-wing pundit after right-wing pundit. Simply declaring yourself “Americas News Channel” won’t work if the viewers don’t buy it. MSNBC’s ratings stagnated and the whole concept was abandoned. If CNN could succeed where MSNBC failed, then, the theory goes, FOX could be taken because the playing field will have been leveled in as much as nobody would have the exclusive rights to the Heartland audience, which FOX currently enjoys mostly to itself, and then it comes down to who has the better pure news gathering operation, resources, and infrastructure and as of this point and time the winner of that contest would be CNN.
Of course this theory is dependent on the premise that FOX won’t beef up its infrastructure and resources. ICN doesn’t think this is necessarily a given. FOX is due to have a huge cash infusion from higher cable/satellite licensing fees and higher ad rates because of its dominance in the ratings. And FOX would have the money to invest back into the organization. Roger Ailes isn’t stupid. FOX isn’t going to just bank the cash. It’s not looking to wait around to fight it out with CNN should it manage to mount a sustained assault. In FOX’s eyes that war is over. It’s looking to take on the broadcast networks now. So even if CNN managed to alter its philosophy and turn to The Heartland, chances are by the time CNN could complete the change, FOX will have had the time to address any weaknesses in its news gathering infrastructure. Which means that CNN’s quest to regain the number one position would be much, much harder than it already is.
There is a wildcard in all this though. And that is the viewing audience. Audiences are fickle and trends never last forever. Hosts retire or jump ship to other pastures. Programs change. World events change viewers perceptions. If the viewing public should, for one reason or another, get it into their heads on their own that CNN in its current incarnation is as good or better an alternative to FOX, then everything I just wrote can be tossed out.
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