Talking Biz News has an interesting interview with Fox Business Network executive VP Kevin Magee.
The interview is pretty wide-ranging, and has a number of interesting anecdotes about his time at CNBC and ABC News, as well as what he is happy with… and not so happy with, at FBN.
We always tweak; that’s what programmers do. I sit in my office with 42-inch monitors all of the time, with the three business networks and Fox News. And most of the time, I’m happiest with what’s on my screen versus CNBC or Bloomberg. It’s a constant operation to put on the best shows that we can.
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Inside Cable News also noted that Magee addressed (or rather dodged) the issue of why FBN is not yet rated by Nielsen:
We’re doing great. We don’t release ratings because we’re not a full-service Nielsen subscriber. We need to have a bit more faith in their ability to count our heads. But anecdotally, we’re catching on ways that we didn’t see six months or a year ago. Don Imus has been a big help to us in terms of visibility. I’m getting more comments from people about Liz Claman. People like what they’ve seen.
For what it is worth, networks complaining about Nielsen’s reliability is nothing new. Even the broadcasters have issues with the service. That is part of the logic behind forming CIMM, which is devising an alternative measurement system that would more accurately measure TV viewing while also incorporating views on other devices.
Of course, Fox News trumpets its Nielsen ratings all the time. It is safe to say that if FBN was consistently beating CNBC, it would be trumpeting them as well… and would be rated by Nielsen.