When you realize the power of the top shows that networks have to offer, it's surprising that they haven't taken advantage of those shows more; now they're starting to.
Fox (NWS-A) followed its powerful "American Idol" franchise with its "Til Death" and the show turned up in the top ten for the first time this year, reaching twice the audience it has been averaging all year. They finished in the 8th spot with 14.07 million viewers.
Seeing how this worked for Fox's "Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?" ABC (DIS) followed one of their big hit shows, "Grey's Anatomy" with their new offering "October Road," which worked well for them, coming in right behind "Til Death," finishing in 9th place and getting 13.93 million viewers.
None of this guarantees that a show will become a hit, but what it does is give an audience the chance to see if it's something they want to continue watching. Some shows in the past have done real good after they've found an audience; something that the networks are trying to find out if a show has right from the beginning.
I'm surprised this hasn't been something that they've done a lot more in the past. It will be a big part of their marketing for the future. I like the idea because it can save a network time by putting it before a strong audience that can in a very short time tell them if they have a potential hit on their hands. That beats having it on throughout a season and getting a small audience hooked on it and then yanking it off the air.
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