NBC Television Network Analysis Case Study

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Introduction

NBC is a diverse international company. NBC stands for National Broadcasting Company. It is involved in media activities, especially television network. It is an American commercial broadcasting television and radio network. Radio Corporation of America was the radio network involved in NBC.

It is this Radio Corporation of America that started the television broadcasting. It was using the profit it made from radio broadcast to develop the television. It is from this that NBC started television broadcast, which was located in Empire State Building in New York. The radio continued to support the television until NBC gained significant popularity. It also became grouped among the best broadcasting business.

NBC television Network airs reality shows like sports news, business news, politics and many others. It also airs soap operas and children programs like cartoons and animation. However, NBC television seems to have lost taste since 2005. That’s the reason why it was ranked fourth in the year 2005 and 2006 in the television ranking of that season.

NBC has however tried to improve and attract some viewers by airing the National Football League around the end of 2006, thus managing to attract football fans. This game was a big accomplishment because improved its rating of that year.

Formation of NBC Universal

Television network under the NBC came up with the NBC universal. This was after the acquisition of the Universal studio movie and the theme park business. NBC Universal was created around 2004. NBC was a subsidiary of industry giant of generic electric. Due to the prolonging disappointing performance by this merged business, general electric decided to reduce losses at the end of 2009. It was to fulfill this by transferring more than half of the business stake to the cable provider business called the Comcast.

Hence, Comcast became the controlling stake in the business. This deal ended at the beginning of the new 21st century. It was now Comcast time to come up with strategy and ideas which were to boost the business back to its leading position. There were a number of regional and cable stations owned by the NBC universal. These stations utilized effectively by Comcast, could have seen the business to the top.

NBC in the 20th Century

20th century started with bad news for NBC. It was around this time when the United States was experiencing a down turn in their economy. Most of the companies in the United States were closed especially the online ones. This also affected the NBC which was forced to reduce the number of its employers. Apart from laying off some of its employers, NBC also lost several millions of US dollars.

During the same millennium period, NBC did not have a clear internet strategy. This lack of clearance made the internet not to differentiate NBC from other portals. According to some analysts, it had a general purpose portal. However, some of the analysts did not have a problem with the general purpose portal. They argued that there was nothing wrong with a media company having a general portal as the company itself is a network.

At the beginning of the 20th century NBC also experienced some financial problems caused by fall in the advertising revenue. Most of the television profits come from the advertising sector. Hence, dropping the advertising revenue meant a stiff financial crisis. It meant no enough money to run the business and even for paying the workers.

However, there is only one positive thing that happened in the 20th century. NBC purchased the broadcast and cable business of Telemundo Communication Group. This was a Spanish television network. The deal was done in 2002. NBC acquiring Telemundo became the only television that devorts a full channel to the Spanish people.

This was received positively, especially by the Spanish speaking population in the United States. This increased the popularity of NBC and also the viewership. Increase in the viewers’ number means an increase in revenue hence, there is an increase in profit margin.

Strengths of NBC Television Network

NBC news has been the most watched newscast. This is because they have been able to divide the news to cables due to the expansion of the news. This led to launching different channels for a specific part of the news. There was a channel for business news, another one for general news with political orientation.

NBC Sports Network was responsible for airing sports news and events. There was also a weather channel which aired weather forecast. This increased the number of viewers as one could turn to the channel that he is interested in. This was made easier by the fact that NBC operates in a 24 hour regular network programming schedule. Hence, with this type of schedule, the viewers could watch what they wish at any time of the day.

NBC possess some technological knowledge. It is even known as the pioneer of new technologies. This knowledge has been used to bring good unique things for the viewers. This helps attract more viewers and also with the unique things to bring about a stiff competition with other networks.

For example, in 1999, NBC launched NBCi which is a NBC internet. It was a publicly held internet firm. It was positioned as a general internet to attract much audience. NBCi was also to attract many advertisers by leveraging the rich and complicated content that they wanted to advertise. It also brought out the e-commerce experience of NBC.

NBC airs the winter and summer Olympics each time they are played. It sells some of its Olympic events that are on demand through its cable television, internet and video. By doing this, it is able to meet the viewers’ interest for real time highlights. NBC also got some cash from the cables, internet and video. It was also able to gain more viewers. Many people also brought in advertisements request due to the increased number of viewers. Increase in advertisement led to a higher profit margin.

Weaknesses of NBC Television Network

NBC decision to make a full television season renewals is a drawback. This is because; the full season pick ups seem more of a sign of the network’s lack of program development. It shows mismanagement and also uncertainty as to what direction the network wants to go next season.

Although most of the shows are getting below average ratings, bringing new shows will make it even worse. Not many people would want to watch a new show especially if it is series type of a show. Therefore, it makes sense to retain some of the shows for a while. The shows that should not be cancelled are those that have a high network.

NBC was the first important network to put up its programming. This became a weakness because the program did not attract many viewers as expected. The network only saw a minor boost in viewers. The program did cost NBC much money but did not yield a good result. This reduced the NBC finances bringing it down even more.

NBC concentrated so much on airing football and athletics that it forgot about other shows which were also important. That is why in 2006, NBC’s revenue went down by 23%. NBC hoped for the winter Olympic to improve the situation. However, poor performance of the United State athletics was one reason which led to the drop of the number of viewers. The viewers could not sit down and watch their own athletics being defeated.

The other primary reason for the decrease in the number of viewers was the competition from other networks especially the ABC. These networks were able to take advantage of the fact that NBC was concentrating on Olympic coverage. They were able to come up with other interesting shows which attracted more viewers especially those from NBC. Hence, the Olympic coverage did not increase NBC viewership as other networks had put their best products forward.

Recommendations on NBC

NBC has all it takes to entertain its viewers. It has 10 fully owned stations which are operational. It also has 200 affiliates on the territory of the States. It is therefore fully equipped to keep all its viewers and listeners well informed by making good use of the station and the affiliates. It can also use the same station to entertain their viewers which will attract more viewers.

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IvyPanda. 2018. "NBC Television Network Analysis." October 25, 2018. https://ivypanda.com/essays/nbc-in-trouble/.

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