Media Life Magazine - For media buyers and Planners

The coming fall season

Readers: NBC will win the fall

Credit the combination of 'Sunday Night Football' and 'The Voice'

By Toni Fitzgerald

September 25, 2015

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Readers say ‘Sunday Night Football’ will lift NBC to another fall victory in 18-49s.

NBC has already won two of the first three nights of the new season.

Media buyers expect that sort of dominance to be a pattern this season.

They think the network will win its fourth straight fall among adults 18-49, on the strength of “Sunday Night Football” and “The Voice,” despite some reservations about the staying power of its new shows.

That’s according to a Media Life survey of media buyers and planners inviting them to weigh in on the new season, which kicked off on Monday.

The largest share of readers, 40 percent, predicted NBC will win this fall in the demo. CBS was the second-biggest vote-getter at 32 percent, followed by ABC at 19 percent. Fox got 9 percent.

“SNF” will be the driving force behind NBC’s win. It’s the top show every fall, and readers predict NBC will easily win Sunday nights with the program.

“Voice,” too, has lifted NBC to big wins on Monday and Tuesday so far this week.

But readers don’t see much promise in the rest of NBC’s schedule.

“Even though NBC will win fourth quarter, it will struggle mightily—again-the rest of the year,” predicted one reader.

In fact, NBC has the new show readers voted most likely to bomb, the Friday night comedy “Truth Be Told.”

Nearly a fifth of readers predicted “Truth” would be the first new show to be canceled. NBC’s “Best Time Ever with Neil Patrick Harris” came in second with 17 percent of the vote.

NBC also had readers’ third choice for earliest cancellation, “The Player.”

As for readers’ pick for breakout new hit, the biggest share, 28 percent, voted for ABC’s “The Muppets.” CBS’s “Supergirl,” Fox’s “Scream Queens” and ABC’s ‘Blood & Oil” tied for second.

Finally, Media Life asked readers which one of the Big Five has the best lineup based on the quality of the shows. ABC was the No. 1 pick, with 42 percent of the vote, followed by CBS at 34 percent.

Interestingly, while readers expect NBC to win the fall, it got only 13 percent of the vote, just behind Fox.

Tags: abc, best new shows, fall shows, nbc, the coming fall season, top new shows