Warc, 10 June 2014
LONDON: All UK broadcasters are facing a decline in the
number of younger viewers but new figures indicate that the BBC and Channel 4
are suffering significantly more than the average.
Between 2010 and 2013 there was an overall drop of 7% in the
number of 25 to 34 year olds watching television in the traditional manner.
Encouragingly for advertisers, commercial broadcaster ITV fared better than
most with only a 3% drop. The BBC, however, recorded a 12% drop, according to
official BARB figures seen by The Independent.
In the younger 16 to 24 demographic the downward trend was
even more pronounced, with a 15% fall across the board. Once again, ITV was
least hard hit, down 13%, compared to 17% at the BBC, 18% at Sky and 19% at
Channel 4.
The Independent suggested that the nation's broadcasters
were "facing a battle to retain young viewers "in the face of the
relentless growth of Google's YouTube platform".
MediaTel noted, however, that these figures did not include
mobile and tablet viewing and could therefore be an indication that younger
audiences were moving online rather than abandoning television altogether.
Channel 4 claimed to have had a positive start to the
current year, with its share of 16-34 year old viewers up 1% year on year.
Further, viewer numbers at one of its youth-oriented channels, E4, were up 5%.
"C4 continues to have a unique appeal with a young
audience," a spokesman said. "In the last three years more than half
of the UK's 16-24 year olds have registered with us as part of our viewer
engagement strategy."
Paul Zwillenberg, partner and managing director of the
Boston Consulting Group, offered an alarming comparison when he said that
"the BBC and Channel 4 are starting to experience newspaper-like audience
declines in their core demographics.
"Digital video is having a transformational impact on
TV viewing; especially among younger audiences," he noted.
Data sourced from The Independent, MediaTel; additional
content by Warc staff
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