Ben Tanner On Ratings

           Ratings. Ratings are not usually what most people think about when they turn their televisions on and watch their regular daily news show or weather forecast. People may not even realize the fact that they do not watch other news shows. All they know is that they enjoy watching a certain person, a certain news cast, or a certain television station. And that is perfectly okay with a news station, as long as they have higher viewer ratings then other stations. When I asked my roommate, who was born and raised in Columbia, why she watches Meteorologist Ben Tanner on WIS every morning her response was, “Because I have always watched him…I grew up watching Ben Tanner and WIS.” She was not really sure why she watched, she just knew she liked to watch.  A good television station and its people can make this happen. However, television stations do trust highly in ratings research to achieve this. Stations look to their ratings to determine if what they are doing is good for a show or not. They also look at their broadcaster’s ratings to determine if they are best for the station and/or the position they are holding. When I asked Ben Tanner how he researches his ratings he said that the sales department is the one responsible for finding the ratings and passing the information along to the News Director, who then e-mails overviews of the station’s, and individual’s, ratings to everyone during each rating period. --So it was then my understanding that Tanner usually only looks at his ratings during the four rating periods; May, November, July, and February. I feel that I might want to be a little more curious about my ratings more often, especially when just starting a career.-- Although Arbitron ratings are a great way for Tanner to see how many people are tuning into his morning shows, YouTube is way Tanner can get an idea of what his viewers think of him. Two years ago, a video of Tanner laughing at a joke and not being able to regain control was posted. The video, since then, has received over 25,000 views, 45 ‘likes’ and zero ‘dislikes’, and people continue to positively comment on the video, the most recent comment being only a month old. The top two comments were examples of how it seems everyone else felt about the video and possibly even how may feel about Tanner. The first comment, Nbkb1 said, “I saw this- live when it happened. It totally made my day! J” This comment received seven ‘likes’. The second, with six ‘likes’, Circusgroupie2005 stated, “I just love Ben. He is the greatest weatherman WIS has ever had. I no longer live in Cola, but I remember when he first started. Great sense of humor!” There are other videos of Tanner posted as well, each with only ‘likes’ and positive comments. The videos show Tanner as an easy-going, funny personable person, which is just what I found him to be when I interviewed him.

            For Tanner’s individual morning shows, he expressed that he has seen a difference in his ratings from 15 years ago to now and a difference in his hourly ratings. He stated that his ratings were higher when he first started because people had fewer options of when to watch in the mornings and fewer options of how to get weather updates. With technology today though some people do not tune into a morning broadcast for the weather but instead get it from an app on their smart phone. Tanner also noted that his highest ratings are in the last half hour of his show between 6:30 and 7 a.m. He attributes his highest ratings to this time because it is when most people are actually awake and watching. To help improve his shows, Tanner said, his boss usually presents special projects to be aired to help boost ratings, especially during the rating periods. Tanner did not have any comments on how he might use his ratings to help any of his career advances, like getting a raise. Tanner also does a radio broadcast every morning for one of the local radio stations in Columbia. He says he has not looked into his ratings for the radio broadcast because it is very short. I, personally, would be interested to know if the radio picked up any extra ratings around the start of my broadcasts that they may not have had before. I would also be interested in knowing what the difference of ratings would be in my television broadcast versus my radio broadcast.

            The last question I had for Ben Tanner about ratings were how important he found his ratings, and his answer was simply that ratings are “very important for the sales department to adjust advertising rates.” I found this answer to be an example of a humble nature. Rather than saying that he might look to his ratings to get himself a raise each year, he gave the illusion that the station could use his ratings to be able to get more money from advertisers.

            Ben Tanner has been doing his job for over 15 years now. He understands that individual ratings are important, not only to keep a job but also to help the station. He is personable and many people in the Columbia area have been enjoying watching him every morning for many years now. He knows what the people like to see in the morning after years of experience in his field. Even though Tanner looks at his ratings mostly during the rating periods, he knows that inorder to keep those ratings and to gain more viewers and higher ratings he must up with technology and make sure to continue improving his shows. Tanner said he is on FaceBook; however, the station wants him to be on Twitter as well, but Tanner said he likes to keep his personal life a bit more private if he can. I think that within the next few years, if Twitter stays as popular as it is, Tanner might come over to the Twitter world. I believe this because Twitter is becoming a faster way for viewers to get a quick update on news and weather, especially if they do not get up for the sunrise weather forecast and this is a good way to reach out to those people. After speaking to Tanner about the research he does I came to the conclusion that I might try to do a few things different in my ratings research. I would want to be a little more involved with different social medias and keep an eye on my followers on Twitter and the number of 'likes' my page recieves on FaceBook. Younger generations are getting smart phones at a younger age, they are becoming more involved with Twitter and FaceBook at younger ages as well, and I would want to try to reach them by keeping up with what they are keeping up with. It is clear though that Tanner knows what he is doing though because he has had his job with WIS for almost 15 years now and it does not look like he is going any where any time soon.