– Terri Peirce, Director of Media Buying
‘Tis the season when all of the networks are flaunting their new and improved fall schedules, parading stars to major advertisers in an effort to garner the largest possible share of the “upfront” budgets. And yes, we’ve been hearing more and more about how the networks compete with each other across all digital platforms—multiple screen, cross-media and social media too. But most buyers and network execs agree that screening shows and program strategies—though traditional and old-fashioned—are still where the viewership—and money—is.
I think CBS CEO Les Moonves said it best: “Everybody’s talking about the second screen but the first screen must come first. There’s no second screen without it.” The bottom line is, without fresh, quality programming coming at us on the first screen, there are fewer reasons for viewers to use any of the other screens to seek out the programming, blog about favorite shows, tweet comments, follow a favorite, “like it” on Facebook, etc.
Meaning, I think it’ll be a very long time before any of us stop saying, “Hey, did you watch such-and-such last night?!” And I hope we don’t. That first screen has been making us laugh, cry and talk to each other for 87 years and I don’t think it’s going away anytime soon.
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/484884-Buyers_See_Plenty_of_Content_But_No_Sure_Hits.php