Dancing & Singing

The Monday 8 p.m. timeslot works well for ABC’s Dancing with the Stars as it fell in the number 3 ranking according to Nielson ratings for the week of March 24, 2008 and the Dancing with the Stars results shown Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ranked 4th. Dancing with the Stars’ rating of 13 translates into 14,664,000 or 13% of a possible 112,800,000 households tuned into the program. The show works best in its current timeslots because it is a strong program for Monday and Tuesday evenings in comparison to its timeslot competition. The program is also better off earlier in the week rather than competing with Wednesday or Thursday night programming.

Dancing with the Stars came in only behind Fox’s American Idol on Wednesday nights which ranked 1st and on Tuesday nights at 8 p.m. which ranked 2nd. It is in ABC’s best interest to avoid going up against American Idol which has a dedicated following and successful longevity over more seasons than Dancing with the Stars. Although there are message boards and options to be able to have information text messages sent to viewer’s cell phones. American Idol viewers even have the option of signing up for an online community on the American Idol Web site, whereas Dancing with the Stars views do not have that option on ABC’s Web site.

It would also work to Dancing with the Stars disadvantage to be in the Thursday night 9 p.m. timeslot because the program would compete with CSI. Although CSI and CSI Miami, ranked 5th with a 10.3 rating according to Nielson ratings the week of March 24, 2008, are different programs CSI probably stands to take away a portion of viewers.

Another strength of the 8 p.m. timeslot is that Dancing with the Stars starts on the hour, whereas the 8th ranked with an 8.6 rating comedy Two and a Half Men begins at 8:30 p.m. Monday nights. However, Two and a Half Men is preceded by Big Bang Theory which works to the advantage of both the CBS programs. College basketball took 6th in the rankings with an 8.9 rating. Having basketball scheduled at 9 p.m. after Big Bang Theory did not seem to hurt the Dancing with the Stars ratings as basketball has a different target audience than Dancing with the Stars audience.

AP Television writer, Frazier Moore’s April 1, 2008 article indicated Fox won last week, averaging 9.93 million viewers (with a 5.9 rating and 10 share) capturing the network's 11th straight weekly success. CBS clipped Fox’s heels with 9.47 million viewers (6.1 rating, 10 share), while ABC had 8.83 million viewers (5.7 rating, 9 share) and NBC had 7.69 million viewers (5.1 rating, 8 share).