http://finance.yahoo.com/news/nfl-ratings-dip-forces-tv-networks-to-repay-advertisers-205733576.htmlNFL ratings dip forces TV networks to repay advertisersLaura Sanicola
The NFL’s television ratings decline this season is beginning to make a dent in the bottom line for major networks. Broadcasters like CBS and NBC saw sharp increases in audience deficiency units (ADUs), or “makegoods,” which are payments they must make to advertisers when ads do not receive the promised volume of impressions.
In other words, fewer people watching football means fewer eyeballs to see ads, and the networks that broadcast NFL games are paying the price.
The major football networks all took a major hit last month in NFL ad revenue—the money they bring in from advertisers that pay for air time during football games.
In the month of November, NBC’s NFL ad revenue sunk 17% compared to last year, according to new data from the Standard Media Index. CBS saw a decline of 26% (earlier this month, AdWeek points out, CBS chairman Les Moonves boasted at a UBS event that “there have been no makegoods” on any of the network’s NFL broadcasts this season). Fox saw a 34% decline in its NFL ad revenue.
To be sure, some of these networks have less football to show this year, and thus less ad space to sell. CBS is showing one less NFL game this season than last season, and Fox is showing three fewer games.
But NBC is showing the same number of games as last season, and NBC saw the biggest decline of the three. It was because of makegoods.
