"Do most stations do a good job of advertising their newscasts or upcoming stories in a way which doesn't irritate viewers or intentionally try to mislead them, or is this an area where they need to improve?"


Almost 30% of all viewers complain about this issue, and two-thirds of them feel strongly about it (particularly men and 35-64s).




What Viewers Really Have to Say about Promotion

The marketing tactics routinely used by many stations in trying to attract or keep viewers actually engender a fair amount of hostility. What really upsets these viewers is when a station "teases" an interesting story which is "coming up," but then fails to run that story in the next segment. These stations then compound the problem by making (and breaking) that same promise repeatedly throughout the newscast. Finally, when the story does come on (usually at the end of the newscast), viewers feel it often turns out to have been way overblown. Even worse is when the story only lasts a few seconds, or is dropped entirely because the newscast is running late.

This hostility is clearly heard in the verbatims: "It pisses me off when they do that...It's annoying...It's irritating...They've lied to you about what they were going to show...They need to define what `coming up next' is. Maybe it's next year...I get sick of it!...It's not nice to be lead on. They intentionally mislead you...They keep baiting you to watch...It's like they're tricking us...It's one of my strongest criticisms of news...If they say it will be up next, it should be up next...I'm getting ready for work, and I gotta keep on running back downstairs to the living room to see if it's on yet."

Viewers also complain about advertising which promotes upcoming newscasts, over promising a given story which doesn't live up to its hype. "It's usually not as big a deal as they make it out to be...It turns out to be nothing." In addition, when a story is hyped all evening, most viewers assume it will be the lead story. Then, if the story isn't actually aired until the middle or end of the show, they feel like suckers. "If they advertise something, they need to put it on within the first 10 minutes of the broadcast, not the last two minutes."

A myriad of other problems surface with these types of teases and promotions. Many viewers say they feel like the station is wasting too much of their valuable time with this type of material, time that could be much better spent covering more news. "You only have so many minutes in a news hour. Please tell me the news, don't hype yourself." Others give examples of hyped stories that turn out to be a rehash of old news, of very important stories that should not have been delayed, etc. Many feel that if a story is as important as a station makes it out to be, they would be breaking into programming with it. "If it isn't news in the morning, it ain't gonna be news at 6:00!"

Some viewers are so turned off that they now refuse to watch the offending stations. A few even cite promotion as the main reason why they've given up on local newscasts, preferring to get their news on the Internet.

Other quotes from local news viewers on the subject of tabloid promos and teases are as follows:

Stations Intentionally Try to Mislead Viewers — "It may not be anything new, but they'll try to entice you just by rewording a phrase...They'll take a quote out of context...The lead-ins are amazingly false...They make it sound like it's something that could pertain to your community, and it's not. It IS misleading...Usually , the resolution to the cliffhanger leaves a lot to be desired...You waste your time waitin' to see what's comin' on, and then it don't be what you think it's gonna be, then you coulda been doin' somethin' else...People should watch because they want to, not because they're coerced into it...If you mislead somebody, that's the same as LYING to them, and that's not nice...It's a form of dishonesty that's put out to us daily...Because they let you think it's gonna be one way, and it's different than what they said. It's basically DISHONEST. And if they're dishonest about that, I'm not sure I could trust other things they're doing."

The "Coming Up Next" Game — "They say it's gonna be on there, and then I don't see nothin'...The story they said they were gonna show never comes on...They give you the impression the story's gonna come up next, and usually it's 20-30 minutes later...They say `stay tuned for the ump-de-ump,' and when they come on, they don't have it on there. Then they go ahead and do the weather, and then when they come back, they do the story they told you to stay tuned for...They've lied to you about what they were going to show...If it's important, tell me now...It's annoying! [They] could be doing a feature on something that's really valid during that time. There's only so much time, and they've taken up half of it telling me what's gonna be on next. So why do I even watch it?...If they say it's coming up, it should be the next thing they talk about, not put at the end of the newscast...Coming up next, coming up next, then it's near the end, and they only spend three seconds on it, and they make you feel like it'll be a long report, and it isn't...Sometimes I'll wait up until 11 o'clock to hear a particular segment because they've hyped it so much. And I KNOW I'm gonna be disappointed, but they've done such a great job at it that I'll stay up anyway. And then they'll put it on WAY LATE in the program to keep you hanging on, and that irritates me to no end. I will NOT watch that news after that!"

They Hype Unimportant Stories — "They push subjects on you that don't have any meaning. It's aggravating...I don't like to be teased about something coming up, and then when it comes up, it's nothing at all. I just don't like to have that happen. They say `we'll tell you about a huge fire latter on.' But they don't tell you where because they want you to watch it...It's usually not as big a deal as they make it out be...They mislead you into thinking it's something really important when it isn't...It's usually not as big a deal as they make it out to be...It turns out to be nothing...The actual story turns out to be disappointing..It's a way to cheat. They make more of it than it really is. They kinda sucker you in...When they finally get to it, it's a minor thing...They try to make it dramatic so you watch...It's never anything worthwhile waiting up to see."

They Waste My Time — "Sometimes, you stay up late and waste your time for nothing. It's just a little report, and it's not worth it...You stay up late for nothing. It's a 2-minute segment, and that's it...They waste too much time trying to keep the viewer watching for the next clip, when they could spend more time just trying to report the news...It's one of my strongest criticisms of news. Sometimes they have two sets of commercial breaks before they get to the story. They'll make you sit there for 25 MINUTES until three-quarters of the way through. That just drives me up a wall. That's probably one of the reasons I don't watch news."