Two of the biggest players in the news broadcast faced rocky transitions last week. Both ABC News and CBS News have announced new leaders, and the executive producer of ABC’s “Good Morning America” has suddenly left the network.
Shake-ups, a source of confusion and anxiety for employees on both networks, each have different causes and different levels of intrigue at the palace. But it betrays a broader trend: in the age of streaming and social media, when the audience for broadcast news is in sharp decline and companies are navigating a difficult transition to digital, the entire industry faces an uncertain future.
ABC News, which competes with NBC News for the primacy in broadcasting, has hired a second-in-command to remote third-party network CBS News, which in turn has announced a new co-leadership structure since, they said. three sources in that network: his current boss no longer wanted the job.
The question over this confusion is a question: What do these new leaders inherit?
“15 years ago in television journalism, the president of the network or even the executive producer was the highest call you can imagine,” said a longtime television news director. “The game I played is over.”
NBC News spoke with more than a dozen current and former news directors, executive producers and other top insiders who detailed similar concerns about the state of major news operations, especially about the future of profitable news shows. in the morning and to the difficult transition to streaming.
Representatives for NBC News, ABC News and CBS News declined to comment.
Financially, the news is in an existential dilemma. The morning shows, the profit centers for each news division in the network, lose hundreds of thousands of viewers every year. Viewing among young people between the ages of 25 and 54, coveted by demographic advertisers, is about half what it was a decade ago, according to Nielsen, the media tracking company.
“There is no NBC News without ‘TODAY,'” a television news veteran said. “There is no ABC News without GMA.”
News networks have survived this decline by charging advertisers more money to reach fewer viewers, a standard television strategy, and a lifeline for media companies as they build their streaming networks. But at some point, several television directors have acknowledged, the big advertisers will probably decide that it is not worth paying higher and higher costs to reach fewer and fewer viewers.
This presents a difficult challenge for news divisions. While audiences for an entertainment show like NBC’s “This Is Us” or CBS’s “The Big Bang Theory” may be as big in their streaming services, some media executives have wondered if there would be a similar interest in streaming morning shows or evening news. NBC News tried to extend “TODAY” to streaming with “TODAY All Day” for 24 hours, and the CBS streaming channel CBSN also offers “CBS This Morning” content. Good Morning America episodes are available on Hulu.
But even if brands like “TODAY” and “GMA” start producing videos that people can watch on demand or attract some viewers to streaming services, it’s not clear that advertising dollars will follow.
The decline of a morning show creates problems for an entire news division, as morning broadcasts account for most of the revenue from broadcast news. An internal sales presentation prepared for NBCUniversal News Group President Cesar Conde last year and seen by NBC News shows that “TODAY” brought in $ 408 million in advertising revenue in 2019, compared to “Nightly News” with $ 146 million. and “Meet the Press” for $ 26 million, according to the document. ABC’s “Good Morning America” brings in advertising revenue of between $ 350 million and $ 375 million a year and accounts for most of the network’s news, ABC sources said.
NBC News could be on a stronger footing than its competitors, as it is part of an NBCUniversal newsgroup that includes MSNBC and CNBC cable assets. (NBCUniversal is the parent company of NBC News.) An NBC News spokesman declined to comment on the sales presentation.
The question now for broadcast news divisions is how to go digital and regain an audience you already lose on TV – and there is no guarantee that every newsgroup will survive. A prominent press executive, who was not aligned with any of the networks, questioned whether CBS, in a remote third place in the morning and evening, was already too far away.
The task of running a broadcast news division has also become more complicated and perhaps less fun. (Susan Zirinsky, the outgoing head of CBS News, did not like the corporate bureaucracy that came with this job.) Previous news presidents were given the mandate to win ratings and win the competition at any cost. unknown, with the new accent. this was put on the promotion of a positive and healthy workplace culture.
Disney put a special emphasis on this when looking for the next leader of ABC News. NBC News obtained a seven-page document from talent recruiters sent to candidates for the position that highlighted three times the importance of promoting an open and inclusive job. There has been less emphasis on maintaining ABC News’ competitiveness.
“Building culture in broadcast television – under constant siege, with declining ratings and relevance – is an ungrateful task,” said a veteran media executive. “In all the oral histories of the Titanic, no one has ever asked, ‘How was culture on the third and fourth decks? ””
In addition to culture, the first task of the new president of ABC News, Kimberly Godwin, will be one that is crucial for the success of the network. The day after Disney announced its hiring, it announced that Michael Corn, the executive producer of “Good Morning America” for seven years, was no longer on the network. The reasons for his departure are unknown. Corn did not respond to a request for comment.
The shake-up leaves Godwin in charge of the most important decision a news leader can make – how to rejuvenate a morning show – at a time when the future of the business is under discussion.
CORRECTION (April 20, 2021, 3:28 PM ET): A photo caption from an earlier version of this article misspelled the last name of a “GMA” anchor. He is George Stephanopoulos, not Stephanopolos.