On the surface, one could argue a town not quite in a TV station's viewing area isn't news. I probably would have argued early in the day sine there was flooding in Fredonia, which is in the viewing area, Coffeyville could wait. Now KWCH fans (employees) I can hear your cheers right now. Yes I will praise your product. I don't know when the decision was made to send a crew to Coffeyville, but it paid especially now since as Jim Grawe said, not only is it natural disaster but an environmental one with oil now mixing with the flood waters. They had the flooding in their viewing area covered at 10PM with a pkg from the Kansas City Fox affiliate WDAF. Michael Schwanke probably had one of the best flooding angles yet, by taking a look back at the year in disasters for the state. We just began July and as Schwanke reported the flooding makes the 3rd disaster declaration this year with over 90 percent of the state having been in some sort of disaster declaration. It was good information and a decent example of taking a story and finding a wider angle to it. In all at 10PM, KWCH spent 10 minutes on the flood while the others switched to regular news earlier into their newscasts. KAKE and KSN had some varieties of stories pulling from local and national video. Now, some of you might say, "Well you didn't see the 6PM." I don't have the numbers from May, I am sure some of you do, but especially as the Summer hits I would say the audience at 10PM is bigger. If this is so why so often are station's wads all blown on the 6PM show? Now one could argue there is more time to fill at 6, given that the newscasts are preceded by national news so they must stay away from it. My response to that would be whats more important losing a few viewers in your 2nd or 3rd segment at 6 or having a lame show at 10 coming off of primetime. In that regard if you hadn't watched news all day, KWCH definitely had a more in-depth and worthwhile presentation at 10PM than the other two.
Don't forget, to vote on which topic you want me to go in-depth on this Friday. The choices are listed below this entry. I will tally them late tomorrow night. -Hal
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4 comments:
Hal Fredonia isn't in anyone's viewing area or DMA either...
Here's the counties that make up the TV markets for Kansas.
http://ekb.dbstalk.com/TVMarkets/Maps/kansas.gif
Now with that said, If KWCH was the only station to have its own reporters in Southeastern Kansas, they dominated this story, I didn't see the 10pm news tonight to judge. Southeast Kansas is not that far of a drive from Wichita either, yet the Wichita stations have to claim clear up to Goodland. Funny perks of this market..
The flooding was and is the biggest story in the state of Kansas whether your market is KC, Topeka or Wichita. To not send a crew there today when the extend of the oil leak was known was a big drop of the ball by KAKE and KSN.
Fredonia is an hour and half away on a good day. Coffeyville is even further. And your map has one error. Elk is much more in Pittsburg DMA than Wichita although people across SE Kansas get KC and Wichita stations even though they are not in the market.
It would be great if all commenters actually watched the news... instead of just beating their own station's drum.
Both KAKE and KSN sent reporters to the flooded areas. All three stations were with the governor on her tour-- and had stories of people affected by the disaster.
You're right. The 10:00 p.m. has a much larger audience than any other show.
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