NBC's TODAY Continues to Close Ratings Gap with GMA

NBC's TODAY continues to gain momentum and tighten the morning ratings race posting its closest total viewer gap with GMA in months. For the week of December 8, TODAY was the number-one morning show in total viewers on Wednesday, its first daily win in more than three months (since 9/5/2014). TODAY was also number one in the key demo A25-54 on Monday and Friday, and slashed GMA's demo lead by a whopping 41% versus the prior week. TODAY placed first in rating A25-54 for the second straight week and posted its closest key demo gap with GMA in more than eight months (since 3/24/2014).

TODAY posted the largest across-the-board gains among the morning news shows versus the 4Q'14 and season-to-date levels. Year-to-date, TODAY places first in all 18-49 demo ratings.

**PLEASE NOTE - This press release does not contain information based on or compared to any Nielsen ratings data from March 2014 through September 2014, as Nielsen will be revising that data. Therefore, no milestone or historical points are included in this release, as they will certainly change.

TODAY HIGHLIGHTS:

Week of December 8

-On Wednesday, TODAY was #1 in total viewers, leading GMA by +59,000; this was TODAY's first single-day victory since 9/5/2014

-TODAY reduced the total viewer gap with GMA for the 3rd consecutive week, hitting its narrowest levels in months

-TODAY posted its second highest total viewer delivery of the 2014-15 season-to-date

-TODAY finished #1 among key demo viewers A25-54 on Monday (+67,000 over GMA) and Friday (+27,000 more than GMA). This is the first time TODAY won at least two days during the same week among demo viewers since the week of 10/13/2014

-TODAY cut the A25-54 gap with GMA by 54,000 viewers, its narrowest gap since the week of 3/24/2014

-TODAY placed first in rating A25-54 with a 1.7 for the second consecutive week

-This is the first time TODAY has placed first in the key demo rating for two weeks in a row since the weeks of 2/17/2014 (final week of Sochi Olympics) and 2/24/2014

-Week-to-week, TODAY posted a +1% gain in total viewers and was the only morning news program to grow its A18-49 and A25-54 deliveries (also up +1% each)

-TODAY narrowed GMA's leads by 16% in total viewers and 41% among A25-54 viewers versus the prior week

-TODAY delivered the biggest growth versus 4Q'14/STD levels in total viewers (+7%, or +316,000), A18-49 viewers (+8%, or +113,000), and A25-54 viewers (+7%, or +134,000)

-Compared to the 4Q'14/STD average, TODAY cut GMA's advantage by 47% in total viewers and 71% among A25-54 viewers

-For calendar year 2014, TODAY is the #1 morning news program among A18-49 viewers

-TODAY averaged 5.156 million total viewers, +57% (+1.862 million) more than CBS This Morning

-TODAY averaged 2.001 million A25-54 viewers, leading CBS by +106% (+1.031 million)

-TODAY averaged 1.583 million A18-49 viewers, topping GMA by +9% (+128,000) and more than doubling CBS by +137% (+914,000)

RATINGS DATA:

Week of December 8

Program HH
Rtg HH
Shr P2+
Imps P25-54
Rtg P25-54
Imps
TODAY 3.7 14 5,156 1.7 2,001
CBS THIS MORNING 2.4 9 3,294 0.8 970
GMA 4.1 15 5,533 1.7 2,055

TODAY.COM HIGHLIGHTS:

For the sixth straight month, Today.com reached more consumers than GoodMorningAmerica.com on Yahoo. Nearly 26 million unique visitors turned to Today.com in November for exclusive interviews and the latest lifestyle, parenting and entertainment news, according to recent data from comScore. Additionally for 14 consecutive months Today.com reached more mobile consumers than GMA on Yahoo. Today.com's strategy to reach consumers across all devices and platforms has paid off as mobile unique visitors have grown 111% over the last 12 months while GoodMorningAmerica.com on Yahoo is down 4% for the same period. As such, Today.com has gone from parity in mobile unique visitors in Sept 2013 to tripling GoodMorningAmerica.com on Yahoo's mobile visitor number in November 2014. (Source: comScore Media Metrix, November 2014).

NBC's TODAY is the news program that informs, entertains, inspires and sets the agenda each morning for Americans. Airing live from 7 am to 11 am ET, TODAY reaches more than 5 million people every day through its broadcast, and millions more through TODAY.com, the TODAY app, and social media platforms. Matt Lauer, Savannah Guthrie, Al Roker, Natalie Morales, Willie Geist, Tamron Hall, Carson Daly, Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb are the anchors and hosts, and Don Nash is the executive producer.

To post a comment, you must register and login.