Why is Cartoon network last when it come to ratings

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xomauraaa

New member
Cartoon network is last out of the big 3 ever Saturday Morning why do you think this is.....Thanks

NICKELODEON 3.7/22 Avg. (7a-1p)
Jimmy Neutron 1.6/20; Jimmy Neutron 2.2/22; Fairly OddParents 3.0/24; Fairly OddParents 3.1/20; SpongeBob SquarePants 4.1/22; SpongeBob SquarePants 4.7/23; Penguins of Madagascar 4.5/22; Back at the Barnyard 4.0/20; Mighty B! 3.8/19; SpongeBob SquarePants 4.3/22; SpongeBob SquarePants 4.7/25; SpongeBob SquarePants 4.8/27
DISNEY CHANNEL 2.3/13 Avg. (7a-1p)
My Friends Tigger & Pooh 1.5/19; Little Einsteins 1.5/15; Special Agent Oso 1.7/13; Handy Manny 2.0/13; Mickey Mouse Clubhouse 2.1/11; Mickey Mouse Clubhouse 1.9/9; Imagination Movers 1.6/8; Handy Manny 1.7/8; Phineas and Ferb 3.5/18; Phineas and Ferb 4.2/22; Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe (145 minutes) 2.9/17
CARTOON NETWORK 1.4/9 Avg. (7a-1p)
George of the Jungle 1.0/10; Chaotic 0.9/7; Secret Saturdays 1.4/9; Pokemon: Diamond and Pearly Galactic Battle 1.8/10; Star Wars: Clone Wars 1.6/8; Ben 10: Alien Force 1.5/8; Batman: Brave & The Bold 1.7/8; Bakugan 2.0/10; Yu-Gi-Oh 5D 1.4/7; Pokemon: Diamond and Pearly Galactic Battle 1.4/7; Pokemon: Diamond and Pearly Galactic Battle 1.6/9
DISNEY XD 0.6/3 Avg. (7a-1p)
Suite Life of Zack & Cody 0.5/7; Phineas and Ferb 0.6/6; Phineas and Ferb 0.6/5; Jimmy Two Shoes 0.6/4; Kid vs. Kat 0.6/3; Zeke and Luther 0.6/3; Monster Buster Club 0.7/3; Phineas and Ferb 0.8/4; Aaron Stone 0.6/3; Aaron Stone 0.5/2; Batman: Animated 0
 
Nickelodeon plays all their big Nicktoons, Disney Channel shows Playhouse Disney (along with Phineas and Ferb, their only current regular cartoon, and Narnia, a movie they premiered fairly recently), while CN has a bunch of action/toyetic cartoons aimed primarily at a specific gender/age group.

It's not hard to figure out why CN is third in cable ratings when it comes to Saturday mornings.
 
wow, way to break that down. Yeah, i completely agree, it looks like CN is basically just throwing out repeats from friday nights and shows aimed at boys in their target demographic. Perhaps if they tried to put some comedies out there. If you look at the successful blocks they are mainly comprised of comedies, be it ABC, Nick, or disney channel. I'd say they need some comedy premieres in there. Of course this would destroy HHT...so idk
 
Well Personally I think Its because CN Cares way to much about the ratings, is why they fail. I mean if a show or Block doesn't get the rateings they want they just cancel it. This causes uproar with its fans, & means they have to find a show to replace it, If CN woukld Just quit being RW's & Start caring about there Viewers again then mabye there rateing would go up!
 
It's not just Saturday morning. CN is in 3rd place in general. Why? Simple. Their shows just haven't connected. Spongebob, Hannah Montana, etc have wide appeal. A show like Chowder doesn't. It's a niche show. CN needs another show like Powerpuff Girls. That was a hit cause it had wide appeal. The characters were cute, so girls liked it. There was action, so boys liked it. And the humor made adults laugh. Boom! Billion dollar hit.
 
You have a point, but I think you're over-simplifying things just a bit. It's not as easy as just saying "Cartoon Network needs another show like the Powerpuff Girls". Really, how often does a major cross-genre hit show happen? A SpongeBob, Powerpuff Girls or Hanna Montana style mega-hit comes along once, maybe twice every 10 years or so, it doesn't occur every day. NO network has an entire cabal of PPG-sized hits. That just doesn't happen. There's no way anyone can determine beforehand which shows are going to strike gold with a multitude of viewers and which ones aren't. If coming up with the next big hit were that easy, then every network would have one.

Cartoon Network needs to stop focusing so much on becoming #1 and stick to their guns. They may not have ever been Top Dog during what many consider to be their "peak years", around 1995 to 2002, but they had many loyal and satisfied viewers, and hardly anyone was complaining about the channel. They need to strive for a resurgance of that level of quality, while still pioneering.
 
Another reason is that Nick has been around longer than CN and parents of today probably just turn their televisions to Nick so their kids have something to watch, not really thinking that there are other networks that air cartoons and kid shows. About the Spongebob/Chowder thing, I don't see where Chowder is any different from Spongebob when it comes to mass appeal, both shows are somewhat similar and both offer child and adult humor. Spongebob happens to be on the more popular of the two networks and he came out right as the older Nickelodeon cartoons were dying out so I think people were looking for something new.
 
I honestly think that Chowder has just a wide of appeal as Spongebob does. Also I really don't see Hannah Montana as wide appeal. I think it's just a smash hit with girls ages 9-14. I didn't know that show had fans in their 40's or anything.
 
It's true that every show isn't gonna be a billion dollar hit. But not every show needs to be a billion dollar hit. Nick has other shows that do well. And Disney too. CN has none because their shows are too niche. They need to make shows with wide appeal. I'm not saying that show is gonna make a billion dollars a year, but it doesn't need to. If it's a top 5 show and makes a $100 million for them then that's good too.



I doubt there's parents that controlling. It's easy to put child block on the adult channels and then giving the kid the remote so they can watch which ever channel isn't blocked.



Sort of. I mean...if you watch it then you can see where the appeal is, but it's not an easy show to market. It looks kinda weird. Kids see an ad for the show and think, "what the heck is that?" With Spongebob it's just a sponge who lives under the sea. What's not to get? You can market that.

It has a wide appeal in the sense that most girls like the show. Just cause a show is for girls doesn't mean every girl is gonna like it. The show has to feature something that appeals to all of them and then be good so they stick around.
 
It's because whenever Cartoon Network finds a hit, they don't know what to do with it. Whenever a hit show reaches a certain amount of episodes, they toss it and move on to something else. Cartoon Network will never have a hit like Spongebob because they'll get rid of their shows before they ever grow that big.
 
To answer the title question:

1. New kid on the block: Both the Disney Channel and Nickelodeon have been around longer than Cartoon Network (April of 1983 and December of 1977 respectively) and naturally are more famous.

2. Brand name: The Disney Channel has the edge of having the Disney name alone which CN doesn't have.

3. Support from the parent companies: Other networks owned or used by Disney will advertise for the Disney Channel in the event that some viewers are unaware of it. If Nickelodeon wants to air an acquisition, Viacom will take care of the details such as cost of said show.

CN on the other hand has no support from WB. The CW and TBS for instance do not advertise the network's presence, nor do they cover the cost of acquisitions. Even worse is that they actually have to pay WB or DC comics for airing one of their shows on the network even though they are part of the same corporation.

4. Other than Star Wars Clone Wars and CN Real, you don't see much enthusiam displayed towards the advertisement of a Cartoon Network show. If you want the viewers to watch, you need to put some excitement into advertising the new shows regularly.
 
I know this probably doesn't effect ratings since this was a recent change, but Cartoon Network is now available in less homes in some regions (D.C. in particular), as it's no longer part of the basic cable package.
I don't know if that's like that in other areas though.
 
That's strange, and now makes me want to convert my cable provider even more, especially since they took away a few channels on the basic plan/No Box, like Sci-Fi/SyFy. It kind of sucks that they're like "Sorry, can't have this channel unless you upgrade to a box."

Guess I should take my brother advice and enjoy CN in my room while I still can if this actually does happen.
 
There are many reasons why CN remains last most of it having to do with not having a solid hit in a while and basically short changing shows that show promise before their time. But that's only part of the problem.

Cartoon Network isn't sure what it wants to be which alienates audiences. Nick and Disney know how to make entertaining live action shows, CN kinda doesn't but that shouldn't be a surprised.

Brand loyalty speaks volumes as well. Nick is the first kids network and it never strayed from that identity. It built loyalty and had quality programing often enough to keep things interesting for long time viewers. Each new generation of kids will be interested in what their sibblings watch and if their sibblings watch Nick or Disney that's what they're going to watch.

CN once had an edge and it's hard to say what did it back then but it could have a lot to do with knowing what they were and having the interest of the viewers. Though they were always niche they had a strong audience because it wasn't too long ago when cartoons were the it thing I guess.

The other factor is parents don't trust CN. Especially ever since Adult Swim came along. They know they can leave Disney and Nick on all day and night and not be concerned with their kids seeing anything too edgy. CN's claim to fame has probably always been edge but once they pushed away the viewers that wanted edgier material or handed them over to Adult Swim they gave up their hold on that audience and they will probably never get it back. So they are left with trying to pick up the pieces of what hasn't been working so far because kids don't flock to them and parents don't approve of them. Now I'm not saying all parents don't like CN that's far from the case but it's been a hot button with vocal parental groups for a while now (mind you these people don't have a clue but their vote apparently matters).

So CN has a lot of things that keep it from being a true competitor to Nick or Disney and so far they've done little to change any of those things and more so strayed away from fixing those things with their notions that imitating the other guys will get them what they want.

Hopefully some day they'll figure it out. I don't admit to know how they can get back in the game but liking what they are sure wouldn't hurt.
 
The channel has been around for 17 years. You make it sound like if it premiered the other day. To a generation of kids, CN has always been around.



Adult Swim doesn't start till 10pm. A kid should be asleep by then.
 
Yes they should but they aren't considering how high the 2-11 ratings for Adult Swim can be. Parents let their kids stay up late especially on the weekends and during the summer but even on school nights they seem to be up pretty late. It's kind of disturbing to me honestly.

When I was a kid bed time was pretty early starting at I think 7PM then it gradually moved an hour until I could stay up until I think 10PM or 11PM and then by that point my parents just assumed I wouldn't stay up because I knew better and most of the time I did go to sleep by then. Come High School I had more free range of my schedule but still couldn't stay up rediculously late but would to finish assignments and occasionally watch Adult Swim.

But I digress... Kids stay up late and even without Adult Swim CN plays TV-14 programing on occasion and PG programing regularly. But parents seem to find even CN's Y7-FV programing objectionable for one reason or another.
 
Thats Much Easier Said then done. Plus CN Doesn't really care about its origional fans anymore they just want to be another generic TWEEN Channel. But whatever, Ive Accepted CN may never be Truly good again (& that origionals & Anime are now in the Minority) But At least CN will always have a few Watchable Shows. & this is another reason why it can't beat hte big 2. It never shows an equal amont of a genre anymore if it had classics, comedy, action & anime like it used to it would still be a contender but as long as it focuses on YTV Acquasitons & that oxymorinic CN live Im afraid the network will always be in 3rd or 4th place. I mean I would'nt be supprised to see XD beating it weekly in another year or 2 if CN Keeps its current state of mind wich is "Get good rating, get good ratings, the shows not getting its quota drop it, the blocks not doing as well as we want, drop it!" As long as CN has this attitude it'll keep on losing to Disney & Nick EVERY TIME!:radda:
 
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