TV RATINGS: Toronto FC vs DC United & Weekend Sports...

[Carts]

Here's the ratings for the weekend sorted by top rated down...

TSN. National / Sun / PGA - 11:00-7:13 = 603,000
TSN. National / Sun / CFL - 7:13-10:05 = 515,000
TSN. National / Fri / CFL - 7:45-10:38 = 458,000
TSN. National / Fri / PGA - 11:00-7:00 = 402,000
TSN. National / Sat / CFL - 8:00-11:10 = 308,000
TSN. National / Sat / PGA - 2:00-7:45 = 297,000
SNet National / Sat / Jays - 7:00-22:00 = 254,000
SNet National / Fri / Jays - 7:30-10:30 = 245,000
SNet National / Sun / Jays - 1:30-5:00 = 241,000
TSN. National / Sun / SportsCentre 10:05-11:30 = 195,000
TSN. National / Sat / SportsCentre - 7:00-7:30 = 187,000
CBC. National / Sun / Track/field - 4:00-5:00 = 181,000
TSN. National / Sat / CFL Pre-game - 7:30-8:00 = 147,000
CBC. National / Sat / Tennis - 7:00-21:00 = 142,000
CBC. National / Sun / Tennis - 1:30-4:00 = 136,000
TSN. National / Sat / SportsCentre - 11:10-12:00 = 134,000
SCR. National / Fri / WWE - 8:00-10:00 = 133,000
TSN. National / Fri / SportsCentre - 10:38-12:00 = 130,000
SNet National / Sat / Connected - 10:00-11:00 = 126,000
CBC. National / Sat / Tennis - 3:00-6:00 = 84,000
SNet National / Fri / Connected - 10:30-11:30 = 80,000
Snet National / Sun / Connected - 5:00-6:00 = 76,000
TSN. National / Sun / Reporters - 10:30-11:00 = 60,000
SCR. National / Sun / EPL Soccer - 11:00-1:00 = 57,000
TSN. National / Sun / Canada Games - 11:30-1:30 = 47,000
SNet National / Sat / Connected - 6:04-7:00 = 34,000
SNet National / Sat / TFC vs DCU - 4:00-6:04 = 32,000

Carts...

[Eastend]

Wow, only 32k. Would you know what our lowest ever was?

[Shakes McQueen]

32k doesn't surprise me - early Saturday afternoon game, on a gorgeous, warm summer day.

- Scott

[BakaGaijin]

32k doesn't surprise me - early Saturday afternoon game, on a gorgeous, warm summer day.

- Scott

Casual sports fans don't care about TFC........regardless of the weather, time of game, or position of the moon in the seventh house.....

[Shakes McQueen]

Casual sports fans don't care about TFC........regardless of the weather, time of game, or position of the moon in the seventh house.....

I understand that, but we've also seen higher TV ratings for TFC games before.

- Scott

[kodiakTFC]

I understand that, but we've also seen higher TV ratings for TFC games before.

- Scott

From what I've noticed..

CBC - Between 80-100k
Sportsnet - Between 30-40k

[scooter]

pardon my nubeeness but what about goal tv
also it was a smokin hot weekend and lots of folks probably on holidays and up north at the cottage

[Beach_Red]

Oky, I know you've heard this before, but won't it be great when Canadian soccer gets these kinds of numbers:

TSN. National / Sun / CFL - 7:13-10:05 = 515,000

[Eastend]

^^yes it will.....not sure who was playing for that but if it was 2 prairie teams there's really not much else for them to do out there.....no?

[mr k]

It was Hamilton vs Sask on Sunday. Nowadays, Sask games always seem to get good ratings. Hamilton is excited because they finally have a team after wandering in the wilderness for years.

Game was also good. 20-0 at half. Hamilton comes back to tie it before losing.

And by the way, don't knock Rider Pride too much. Along with tv ratings, they're the fan base TFC supporter groups and especially the rest of the BMO should look up to. They're wild, dress up like it's Halloween 24/7, travel well and ex pats always come out numbers in other cities.

[ochos]

Only game I missed going to this year.. work trip white water rafting along the Ottawa River!!

Was honking like crazy when I heard the result on the radio driving home yesterday :)

[boban]

From what I've noticed..

CBC - Between 80-100k
Sportsnet - Between 30-40k
You hit it bang on.
Nothing to do with time of day, which day or temperature of the day.
It's all about the carrier.

[stugautz]

TSN. National / Sun / Reporters - 10:30-11:00 = 60,000
TSN. National / Sun / Canada Games - 11:30-1:30 = 47,000
SNet National / Sat / Connected - 6:04-7:00 = 34,000

I thought of the 3 we'd at least have Reporters beat!

[Platts]

Sportsnet has to address the horrible commentating of Dobson.
i hate to say it but he is absolutely brutal. it just isn't his forte.
He is in the loop of the league and the sport in general, but he just isn't a good in game communicator. IMO

[TFCRegina]

^^yes it will.....not sure who was playing for that but if it was 2 prairie teams there's really not much else for them to do out there.....no?

A lot of those Prairie folk with nothing to do support TFC as well, thank you very much.

[Beach_Red]

Sportsnet has to address the horrible commentating of Dobson.
i hate to say it but he is absolutely brutal. it just isn't his forte.
He is in the loop of the league and the sport in general, but he just isn't a good in game communicator. IMO


If they could just get him to talk a little more bout the game as it's going on and not spend so much time talking about the ramifications of a win or loss from the 50 minute mark on.

I get that he's excited about it, and that's good, but we're trying to watch the game that's going on RIGHT NOW!

[jloome]

There's still very little national-level interest in TFC, compared to other sports. That's all.

If you look at the actual time slot, not the ratings versus everything else, you get a more telling issue: they were competing with the PGA championship. Lots of casual sports fans tune in golf, particularly when Tiger Woods is up against it late.

[mmmikey]

anyone remember seeing a promo on sportsnet for an upcoming tfc game? ever? i rarely watch it anymore so it could just be me.

promo isn't going to make casual fans turn in and compete with those other sports.. on the other hand i know a lot of ppl who all things being equal if they were home would be interested, but unless i tell them there is a game, they have no idea it's on. would like to see more commercial slots to hype up these games..

[Strikers]

I think it has alot to do with the commentating, Gerry is a great reporter and I would like to see him as just the host of the telecast ala Ron Maclean. Sportsnet should look to sign Nigel Reed, or try someone else. There's not much worse that can happen by trying.

[TFC07]

People got to realize that not everyone in Canada and some of Northern USA states has Sportsnet channel unlike CBC. But however, in the past TFC were getting high ratings on Sportsnet (Sportsnet standards). I think the reason why rating was so low this time because everybody was outside enjoying the weather.

[TFC John]

Does anyone know how accurate these numbers really are? How are they collected. I imagine they are the result of some kind of sampling that is then extrapolated to give an estimated result. I expect the numbers would be relatively accurate when dealing with a large sample but when you get into a niche market like MLS in Canada a small sample could lead to large inaccuracies.

For instance if there are 30M people in Canada there are probably 10M TVs (I have no idea really). No one could monitor 10M sources of data so the rating company has to use a smaller sample to represent the whole. I think it would be pretty challenging to monitor 10,000 sources of data but that would be a ratio of 1:1000. When you look at a show like American Idol you might find that 3,000 of your sheep (TV viewers) are watching it, that would multiply out to 3,000,000 total viewers. That's relatively accurate because you have a large sample. If your sample is over or under by 30 people it is only a 1% change in the final result.

At the other end of the scale, when you talk about a market share of 32,000 viewers that would be only 32 data points because in this model each data point translates to 1,000 total viewers. Here a variation of 30 viewers is almost a 100% measure of error.

I question the accuracy of these numbers when they are so low. I don't know anything about the tv rating business but I do understand math. For these numbers to be more accurate than I have portrayed them here the ratings company would need to monitor more than 10,000 tvs. I've never met anyone who participates in these rating polls, have you? I expect people must get paid to participate. How much would it cost to collect the data and how much would it cost to break it down and analyze it? In my mind there is a logical limit on how much data it is worth collecting. How worthwhile is it to improve your accuracy on a program that only 30,000 people are watching?

Based on how much money I have spent on TFC related purchases I will tell any advertiser that it is totally worth putting your product in front of a consumption whore like me. And every week I can show where 20,000 others will be.

[prizby]

pathetic that some dumb show like the reporters doubles our viewership

pathetic that our viewership on tv can't even double the number of fans at the stadium

pathetic


whats worse is the CFL get 500k...wtf, 1/70th of Canada will watch the CFL ????



150k for CFL pregame show wtf

[Carts]

Does anyone know how accurate these numbers really are?

I question the accuracy of these numbers when they are so low.

PM'ed you the details...

RATINGS ARE NOT POLLS like the old days...

Carts...

[kshep]

For my thinking TFC will never rate good nationally.. because well, it's local.. Once Vancouver and Montreal start league play then I'll expect to see a slight increase in national viewership because more people have a stake in the outcome of the various matches. I'm more interested in knowing the break down by province in terms of viewership, I'd suspect that most of that 32k is based in Ontario(I.e. People who can't gets ducats for the match). To me Ontario viewership is more important than the rest of the country, if you can't get people interested who live within an 8 hour drive, How/Why do you expect someone who lives outside Ontario to take any interest.


On top of that, when no other league matches are shown outside of TFC you can't ever expect viewership to grow. Until you get the chance to catch 2/3 MLS matches outside of Canadian content a week, we'll never see any real kind of interest from the casual sports fan. The sad fact that I get more EPL a week then the local league is a joke. I'd rather see two more MLS matches a week then the EPL the score and sportsnet show.

[TFCRegina]

pathetic that some dumb show like the reporters doubles our viewership

pathetic that our viewership on tv can't even double the number of fans at the stadium

pathetic


whats worse is the CFL get 500k...wtf, 1/70th of Canada will watch the CFL ????



150k for CFL pregame show wtf

CFL actually gets better ratings on average than NFL in Canada...especially the Grey Cup.

It's viewed as Canada's Summer game.

[prizby]

CFL actually gets better ratings on average than NFL in Canada...especially the Grey Cup.

It's viewed as Canada's Summer game.


your joking...i can't even stand listening to there commentators...dave randolph or whoever it is etc...

[deschamp86]

PM'ed you the details...

RATINGS ARE NOT POLLS like the old days...

Carts...

I'm also curious of how these ratings work if you wouldn't mind PMing me the same info.

[TFCRegina]

your joking...i can't even stand listening to there commentators...dave randolph or whoever it is etc...

I'm not kidding at all.

It's a simple fact. If you don't like it, don't watch it. Plenty of people like it though.

[TFCRegina]

I'm also curious of how these ratings work if you wouldn't mind PMing me the same info.

Actually, AC Nielson still collects the majority of their data from polls. They use three statistics gathering methods. Read up on the Nielson ratings on wikipedia. Explains it in great depth.