Learning to live in Lilliput, the media land where small is beautiful: optimizing reach with low ratings and other thoughts on TV fragmentation

Severe TV audience fragmentation in the United States is prelude to a worldwide ratings slide. This paper argues that from the experience in the United States, audience fragmentation does not signal the end of mass market television.

Learning to live in Lilliput, the media land where small is beautiful. Optimizing reach with low ratings and other thoughts on TV fragmentation

Erwin Ephron(Ephron, Papazian Ephron inc.) United States

'Fragmentation' is the new bogeyman1. It used to be 'clutter'. Buyers seem to question whether advertising, as we know it, can survive the loss of the twenty-rated TV show. What a puzzling reaction. We appear anxious and depressed about television's future when we have many reasons to rejoice. Television isn't shrinking, it is splintering. Viewers continue to watch more than twenty-eight hours a week - this audience...

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands