War Of The Networks

An exciting time for broadcast media with a neck-to-neck battle for No. 1

If there’s a good reason why TV fare is better than ever before, it has to be the blistering competition among the rival networks ABS-CBN and GMA-7. Tired of always being a runner up, GMA has finally decided it wants to be at the totem pole of the ratings game. But ABS-CBN, the long-established leader, is not about to yield ground that easily.

How GMA came to the realization that it should not be content with being a distant second in the ratings game is something that did not occur overnight. In fact, it took a change in management, and with that, a change in mindset, before the company was able to convince itself that it could slug it out with ABS-CBN.

Today, the gap between the two stations has been substantially narrowed, with each station claiming overall ratings supremacy.

ABS-CBN, with its vast network and facilities, has been the long-established leader in the television industry for years

Ratings, of course, are always changing, which is why the two stations are forever challenging each other’s claims. GMA, for instance, trumpets that in the first quarter of 2004, it surpassed ABS-CBN in total day ratings – a claim that ABS-CBN contests.

The Ratings Game

At present, there are two main sources of TV survey reports: AC Nielsen and Audits of Great Britain (AGB). The two agencies conduct their surveys by attaching a device on the TV set that transmits data to their office. Each device costs US$1,000 and these are provided to households following an orientation and disbursement of cash incentives to homeowners.

Survey results are the main concern of advertisers. But viewers pay no mind to what these say. Of course, in the end, they are the ultimate beneficiaries of the fierce fight for ratings supremacy.

Advertisers will always choose to put their ads in shows that have higher viewership. Thus, when one channel discovered that Mexican telenovelas can get housewives glued for hours to their TV sets, the other channels lost no time in importing a whole caboodle of telenovelas, not just from South America, but from the whole of the United Nations. The result – viewers flip from one channel to another in the hopes of catching how the heroine in soap opera A will catch her paramour while at the same time knowing how the heroine in soap opera B will pull off the same caper.

Excited viewers cannot care less about their overused remote controls. Competition is always a consumer’s best friend. The fear that the competitor will spring up something better spurs self-respecting companies to outdo the other, if not itself. The result – better products, happier consumers, and in the case of the networks, this simply means better TV fare.

Fighting Strategy

In the network war, the main battleground is always perceived to be the creative department. Both ABS-CBN and GMA have spent heavily on their creative teams in the hopes of developing innovative programming to catch viewers’ attention. Both have staffed their creative departments with the young and the young-at-heart who are able to create trends and stay ahead of them.

For GMA, though, the war was not waged in the creative department alone. It did so by changing top management. Ironically, its top dogs were alumni of their main adversary. Manuel Quiogue, chief operating officer of GMA 7, is largely responsible for narrowing the ratings gap between his present and former employers to within six ratings points (from the former 18). Quiogue set up Studio 23, ABS-CBN’s UHF station, and was the creative force that propelled it up from nowhere to the consciousness of lower A to upper C viewers.

Though known for his creative genius, Quiogue sought to put GMA in fighting form by addressing basic business and personnel concerns – its sales were a pittance compared to its rival’s, and GMA was always seen to be a poor second to ABS-CBN. People did not seem to think it could go any other way. The sales force was not motivated too, and their compensation schemes hardly served as a motivational tool but rather, as a handicap.

Survey results are the main concern of advertisers. But viewers pay no mind to what these say. Of course, in the end, they are the ultimate beneficiaries of the fierce fight for ratings supremacy.

He gained much needed support from network president Atty. Felipe Gozon, who made no bones about his goal to take his station to the top. Not only did he allocate funds for program development, he also gave Quiogue a free hand to streamline quotas and incentive schemes so as to motivate the sales force to push a fighting brand. Accompanying the sales structuring was a training and motivational program for the employees.

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