Ratings Analysis: Is 'The Voice' Season 4 Premiere in Jeopardy?
ABC announced today that The Bachelor star Sean Lowe will be competing on the new season of Dancing with the Stars which premieres March 18, 2013. What does this mean for the ratings of The Voice on NBC a week later? A LOT.
The season finale of The Bachelor scored a 3.3 adult rating on Monday, up from last year's 2.8. The After the Final Rose special got a 3.8 adult rating, up from 3.3 last year. This is HUGE considering that Daylight Saving Time affects viewership patterns negatively on the week after it hits.
It looks like ABC is capitalizing on the popularity of their Bachelor this year by putting him on Dancing with the Stars. Look for him to boost ratings of DWTS next week. I now think it's going to happen.
What does this mean for The Voice? Well, for starters, we are probably going to get a very weak opening even with new coaches Usher and Shakira. It's defintely not going to get its Super Bowl numbers and most likely won't even beat the 4.2 it posted for the Season 3 premiere in the fall.
The Voice Season 2 premiered to high ratings after the Super Bowl last year and sustained it for a few weeks up until three things: Daylight Saving Time, the Battle Rounds and Dancing with the Stars.
NBC has solved the DST dilema by premiering after the time change and the show tweaked the Battle Rounds in Season 3 by adding "The Steal." (Also the Blind Auditions are the most popular part of the show -- so there's no danger in terms of show format). The Dancing with the Stars threat however still lingers. In fact, last year, DWTS dragged The Voice down to the 3's by April. (This is when I realized that these type of shows share the same core audience).
Though The Voice soundly defeated DWTS last fall -- that may not be the case this time. DWTS suffered from a lackluster All-Stars cast but now it has a ratings-proven Sean Lowe on board.
Plus, NBC as a network has bombed all through mid-season, falling behind Univision. There's a good chance that The Voice may fall into the black hole that is NBC right now. After much network fanfare, the network could only muster a 1.0 for Smash when it premiered a few weeks ago (among a long list of failures).
I'm worried.
All I really want is steady, well-watched ratings.
What do you guys think? I'm I being too paranoid?
P.S. I just realized that in the bigger picture of Rickey.org, it doesn't matter -- we'll get a lot of DWTS fans this season, which is still a good thing! :)