Tuesday 18 January 2011

Star and Express continue running 'ads' for 'The Vanessa Show'...

Another day, another article in the Richard Desmond-owned Daily Star about The Vanessa Show, broadcast on the Richard Desmond-owned Channel Five.

This one explains how a discussion about DIY 'turned the air blue':

The saucy pair [Vanessa and her guest] forgot the cameras were there and started littering their chat with X-rated innuendo.

They giggled like schoolgirls as they cracked naughty jokes about “screwing”, “hammering things in”, and “inserting drills in and out”.

Had such, ahem, 'X-rated innuendo' been on the BBC, the tone of the Star's article might have been very different. Peter Dyke's 'story' makes clear that this 'incident' took place during the filming of the episode that is being broadcast today. So it's yet another advert being passed off as news, with claims about X-rated chat and giving the 'censors' a 'headache' a desperate attempt to drum up interest in the show. And, conveniently, mention what time the show is broadcast.

A shorter article about the guest on Monday's show was published yesterday.

And as Anton Vowl noted in his post about writers at the Star and Express being forced to write this stuff, the Sunday Express' TV editor David Stephenson also did his bit. Under the headline 'Fantastic Vanessa Feltz is a must see' he said:

New to the market last week comes The Vanessa Show (Five, Monday-Friday), the most promising new show in daytime television. Vanessa Feltz is the busiest presenter around with a brace of radio shows on the BBC, a newspaper column for the Daily Express and now a daytime chat/magazine show.

Billed as the “Queen of Morning TV”, there’s little doubt that Vanessa has ample energy and brims with confidence on the sofa. Her break from television has given her a new chutzpah.

However, the best feature of her presentation style is that she doesn’t fall into the common trap of worshipping celebrities like modern-day saints (Lorraine being by far the worst offender, followed by This Morning).

First up on the sofa was former Pussycat Doll Kimberly Wyatt from Sky’s Got To Dance. Vanessa confronted the singer/dancer-turned-reality judge with this friendly gambit: “I would quite like to hate you!” What?

The presenter went on to explain how Kimberly, with her model looks, must make women insanely jealous to the point of “hate”.

The show also features Vanessa’s fiancĂ© Ben, who chimes in at various points, and a life coach who, most surprisingly, speaks a lot of sense if you believe in that sort of stuff. At least his first “patient” in Reading appeared to have discovered how to use a webcam.

So, all in all, and in the words of Len Goodman, “Good job!”

Probably the same words that Richard Desmond uttered when he read that 'review'.

Then, last Friday, the Star was at it again, this time re-telling an entirely uninteresting story told by one of the guests on the show. It appears this is going to become a staple of the Star and Express for some time to come:

Vanessa Feltz’s new TV show has caused a sexy stir and seen ratings soar in its first week. Saucy Danielle Lineker even left the telly host, 48, lost for words by confessing husband Gary had caught her in a compromising position with another fella. The model spilled the beans on yesterday’s The Vanessa Show on Channel 5.

The 'compromising position' wasn't really any such thing. And just in case there was any doubt this was simply an advert for Channel 5, the article ends:

The babe is just one of the guests who have spiced up Vanessa’s new show – on at 11am, Monday to Friday every week – and fans can expect more revelations next week. Guests include Liz McClarnon, 29, on Monday, Hayley Tamaddon, 33, on Tuesday and Myleene Klass, 32, on Wednesday.

But is the Star correct to say ratings have 'soared'? You would probably assume that's not the case given they feel the need to keep running these 'adverts' for the programme. If anyone has the viewing figures, please do post them in the comments below.

15 comments:

  1. Will you be covering the relentless puffery by the Guardian of the new C4 show 10 O'Clock Live (hosts: David Mitchell (Observer columnist) and Charlie Brooker (Guardian columnist)) in future blog posts?

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  2. Anonymous - A search of The Guardian website only seems to find two articles about that show (and two other articles which have mentioned it in passing) this year. That doesn't seem 'relentless'. Plus, it's a rather different situation as The Guardian doesn't own Channel 4.

    So no, probably not.

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  3. It has been mentioned at the end of their columns as well, but in tiny italic type. Hardly relentless- and they've not been self-promoting it either. Maybe you're confusing actual advertising with the duplicitous cross promotion of the Express group and Channel 5?

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  4. BARB (the British Audience Response Board, the group which produces independent ratings) releases its viewing figures 8 days after the end of each week. As far as I know, the Star should have no idea whether ratings have "soared" yet.

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  5. atomicspin, those are the "final" numbers as they include timeshifted viewing as well. But there are overnight figures available. None of which is to imply that N&S aren't making it all up, of course.

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  6. This is the link for the programme viewing figures by channel:

    http://www.barb.co.uk/report/weeklyTopProgrammesOverview?

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  7. Anonymous - Yes, I was hoping to find some overnights but couldn't find anything definitive.

    Bob - Thanks. It looks like we may have to wait until next week to see the figures (week ending 16 Jan) that will confirm, or otherwise, if the Star was correct.

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  8. Overnights for 'The Vanessa Show'

    Monday 10 Jan - 157,000 (2.8% share) ('The Wright Stuff', which preceded it, had 296,000).

    Wednesday 12 Jan - 109,000 (1.5% share)

    For comparison - on the same Wednesday 'Home and Away' got 983,000, 'Neighbours' 1.28 million and 'Live from Studio Five' 300,000.

    So - from the opening show of the first week to the third show the overnight ratings fell by nearly a third. Even at the point of peak interest (the opener) it got about half what Wright gets, it performs poorly compared to the other daytime shows, and by day three got ratings around a third of the very poorly performing (and widely derided) 'Live From Studio Five'.

    I've not seen any 'Vanessa' ratings for Thursday or Friday, so in fairness they might have rocketed, but that doesn't seem very likely does it?

    Also, in fairness, The Dirty Desmond Group may have access to the next day consolidated (timeshift included) figures (it is possible to obtain them before the weekly reports from BARB appear), and there's always the chance of high viewing figures via 'Demand Five'...

    Duncan

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  9. Keep a watch on the Ratings thread on Digital Spy:
    http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=1422192

    They always have overnights and if the show isn't listed in the daily round up, ask, and someone will be able to get the results you're after.

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  10. I saw from this that The Vanessa Show is doing badly! Apparently, only 40,000 people!

    http://uk.tv.yahoo.com/news-extra/article/107387/vanessas-viewing-figure-nightmare.html

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  11. According to the Mail website (so take with a pinch of salt!), ratings have collapsed to just 40-60,000. If thats true, then it explains why Desmond is acting in desperation to push this show as much as possible.

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  12. The Mail actually nicked the story from 'The Sun' but put it's own twist on it by blaming Vanessa boyfriend for the show losing so many viewers so quickly.

    I wonder why he's been singled out for all the blame surely a respectable paper like the DM wouldn't play the race card!

    It is interesting that the Mail and Sun have both stuck the boot into Vanessa and Channel 5 because I always thought the tabloids proprieters had an unwritten rule about never directly slagging each other off.

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  13. Is Desmond really so short-sighted that he would risk the end of self-regulation by withdrawing from PressBOF just so that he can plug a shitty chatshow?

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  14. I've heard Vanessa on the radio when I was at the dentist. The dentist's drill was a welcome relief from the 'every woman' stick she does.

    No wonder people turned off after The Wright Stuff. As flawed as TWS might be it's still entertaining.

    Ally Ross in the Sun probably summed the programme up perfectly in his column on Tuesday.

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  15. Hi TW. Here are Vanessa's overnights by day since launch:
    Date Start time 000s
    10/01/2011 11:00:00 163
    11/01/2011 11:00:00 95
    12/01/2011 11:00:00 108
    13/01/2011 11:00:00 178
    14/01/2011 11:00:00 79
    17/01/2011 11:00:00 116
    18/01/2011 11:00:00 89
    19/01/2011 11:00:00 106
    20/01/2011 11:00:00 93

    So far it's averaged 114,000 (0.11m) viewers.
    The weekday slot average for the previous 13 weeks is 212,000 viewers, meaning Vanessa is currently performing -46% below slot average (previous occupant was Trisha Goddard, whose show was axed at the end of 2010).

    So are Vanessa's ratings soaring? Not a chance.

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