Peninsula Daily News news services
NEW YORK — This past week, the streets of midtown Manhattan swarmed with TV executives beginning the process to woo ad buyers to their upcoming fall lineups with splashy presentations, star-packed cocktail parties and plentiful swag.
But there’s an air of urgency for the suits at the legacy networks — CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox.
They’ve been rocked by an ominous first.
A basic cable program — AMC’s zombie apocalypse drama “The Walking Dead” — outperformed every scripted show on television this season in the advertiser-coveted 18- to 49-year-old demographic.
And zombies are the least of it.
Competition is closing in from every corner and on every device.
DVRs are frustrating advertisers by allowing viewers to skip ads.
Netflix, Amazon and a host of online Web services are producing original fare.
Aereo, mogul Barry Diller’s new service that allows broadcast signals to be watched on hand-held devices, poses another threat that the networks are trying to extinguish with litigation.
In this environment, network TV executives at the week’s “upfronts” found themselves pitching their new shows after a season most notable for its failure to produce a single hit.
Not surprisingly, most analysts expect tepid advance sales for prime-time commercials, with possibly zero growth over last year’s $9.2 billion.
Meanwhile, analysts predict cable’s share of the pie will continue to grow, up as much as 7 percent, to an estimated $10 billion.
“I don’t think it’s an exaggeration at all to say this season was a tipping point,” said Matti Leshem, chief executive of the brand strategy company Protagonist.
“If I were a network executive right now, I’d be very nervous, because we have finally reached a point where everyone is questioning the efficacy of television as a medium for reaching audiences, which is really what this is all about.”
TV bosses also hope their existing series will last long enough to catch on — much as “The Big Bang Theory” did for CBS. Once the sitcom about Cal Tech nerds found its way to syndicated reruns, the audience for fresh episodes exploded.
As home of the hits “The Big Bang Theory” and “NCIS,” CBS looks poised to win this season in both total viewers and adults ages 18 to 49, according to Nielsen.
But even with a victory, CBS’s ratings will probably remain flat among viewers in that all-important demographic.
Meanwhile, the other three major networks all saw their audiences shrink among 18- to 49-year-olds.
“This is an incredibly tough environment we’re in right now, and even getting people to sample shows is much harder than even just two or three years ago,” said Joe Earley, chief operating officer at Fox Broadcasting.
