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Two TV stations remake their approach to local news in markedly different ways. The big question is which one, if either, viewers will take to.
By ERIC DEGGANS, Times TV Critic
© St. Petersburg Times, published October 27, 2002
What does it take to draw local TV news viewers in the Tampa Bay area?
Is it an aggressive news operation that emphasizes breaking news, live reports and investigative exposes? Or is it an informal broadcast filled with feature stories, less crime coverage and regular reports on health and education issues?
Because of high-profile makeovers at WFTS-Ch. 28 and WTSP-Ch. 10, viewers are about to find out. And the results may speak volumes about what viewers want from their local newscasts and newscasters.
"Unfortunately for them, because (the stations) have millions of dollars riding on this question, the answer (of which format viewers will prefer) is not predictable," said Valerie Hyman, a St. Peterburg-based TV news consultant. "A lot of this is style. ... It's form but not content. How it's going to play is anybody's guess."
WFTS' makeover kicked in first. The station inaugurated its "ABC Action News" brand and the slogan "Taking Action for You" on Oct. 7.
As the station's second visual format change in six months, it seems to reflect a central focus of local TV news competition: the brand.
"8 On Your Side." "Tampa Bay's 10." "Your News All the Time." Local TV news operations consistently emphasize slogans that pithily describe each station's focus, approach to delivering news and method it hopes to hook viewers with.
WFLA-Ch. 8's "8 On Your Side" champions advocacy for viewers' needs. Bay News 9's "Your News All the Time" trumpets the cable news channel's 24-hour availability. But WFTS' previous slogan, "You Need to Know," seemed ambiguous and less urgent for a station focused on breaking news, live reports and hard-hitting investigations.
By Oct. 4, WFTS was announcing the hiring of a creative services director, and days later, Action News was the new brand in town.
Now on WFTS' airwaves, it's inescapable. There's the Local Action Doppler weather radar. The Action Newsroom. Action Headlines. Action Sports. Active Living With Linda health segments. Action Against Terror terrorism reports.
Onscreen graphics identifying story subjects and speakers often bear the "Taking Action for You" slogan, even if the story has nothing to do with viewer advocacy. A videotaped replay of a recent space shuttle landing bore a "Breaking News" logo, though the landing had occurred many minutes earlier.
Action News is a well-known slogan in TV news circles, identifying a super-successful format pioneered in Philadelphia circa 1971. It features lots of short stories, many voiced by the anchor with no reporter, and a wide range of community coverage with little depth.
Though the format was exported to many places (WTSP bore the Action News slogan until 1989), that doesn't seem to define precisely what WFTS is doing, which involves huge graphics, lots of live reports and stories that lend an urgent feel.
Assessing the station's goals is tough, mostly because WFTS officials did not return several calls for comment. News director Bill Berra, who was brought to WFTS in May 2001 to save a station seriously floundering in the ratings, would say only, "I don't want to talk about these things. You will write what you write."
The "ABC Action News" slogan removes WFTS' references to its frequency position, something featured in previous brands, "28 Tampa Bay News" and "28 News." And that move makes sense in a market where 77 percent of viewers get their TV through cable, meaning the station may not be seen at Channel 28.
Forrest Carr, news director at rival WFLA, noted that WFTS' new slogan highlights an advocacy role, something his station showcases in its "8 On Your Side" brand.
"We know people want relevancy and meaning and perspective (in news), but we think they also want a sense of advocacy," Carr said. "They want to know we have values and see us apply them. And people invest their affection in our anchors."
Of course, such window dressing doesn't matter much unless the content follows suit. And WFTS has worked hard for months to differentiate itself in coverage, recently sending anchor Kelly Swoope to Maryland for sniper coverage, Don Germaise to Alligator Alley for the terrorist false alarm and reporters to New York, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C., for Sept. 11 anniversary coverage.
"It is very much about trying to find what segment of the audience is not being served," Carr said. "Channel 28 is trying to brand itself ... and Channel 10 has launched a show that is very soft and fluffy and chatty. Of those two, Channel 10 is clearly providing the one service that wasn't provided before ... though I don't think the audience interested in that kind of approach would be particularly large."
Carr was referring to Life Around the Bay, a new hourlong show WTSP unveiled Oct. 14 that presents its reports in a relaxed, feature-friendly setting, reminiscent of morning shows such as CBS' The Early Show and NBC's Today.
Anchors Mario Diaz and Marty Matthews spend a lot of time chatting about stories, which have included in-studio interviews with a child psychologist, a preview of the Clearwater Jazz Holiday (co-sponsored by WTSP) and a feature encouraging viewers to help recent Las Vegas transplant Diaz discover new parts of the Tampa Bay area (in the interest of disclosure: WTSP and the St. Petersburg Times share news and features under a partnership agreement).
Primary anchors Reginald Roundtree and Sue Zelenko offer news headlines during the show, which is centered on a cramped new set drenched in shades of red. Other contributors offer regular reports on health and school issues, but no sports. The approach seems focused on female viewers, particularly stay-at-home moms.
To those accustomed to traditional newscasts, Life Around the Bay's increased anchor "happy talk" -- a format of between-stories banter that saw its greatest popularity in the mid 1970s -- looks suspiciously like the station is walking away from hard news content until 6 p.m.
Not so, said WTSP general manager Sam Rosenwasser. "Our stories are about people ... real people, not focusing on events," he said. "For us to try and go head-to-head with what everyone else is doing may not get us where we want to go. When you think about who is available from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., it's more female than male. ... So you say, 'Let's try to attract the audience that is there."'
The new show also ties into an approach that has been under development for a while at WTSP, where news director Lane Michaelsen, a former TV photojournalist who keeps the camera belt he once used hanging on his office wall, has emphasized better storytelling and different approaches to news.
It's epitomized by WTSP's new branding slogan relating to life in the Tampa Bay area: "Enjoy it. We do."
A cynic might say such a slogan encourages complacency and an acceptance of the status quo, curious attitudes for a news outlet expected to serve incisive local journalism.
But Michaelsen disagreed. "It says we live in a diverse place and most of us who live here enjoy it, so why don't we come out and say it?" he said, citing WTSP's recent stories on lapses at the state Department of Children and Families as evidence of the station's commitment to news coverage. "We also have stories that help celebrate life around the bay and point out the good things. I think TV stations can do their communities a disservice by not doing that sometimes."
Still, the new show fumbled in its first week, lending a feeling that WTSP may not be sure how much the program should depart from the conventions of typical newscasts. The approach might get better with time, but the station risks its credibility by offering a 5 p.m. newscast so lacking in real news.
Phil Metlin, vice president of news at Fox affiliate WTVT-Ch. 13, came to the market in June 1997 and pulled his Fox-owned station back from a tabloid (some might say Fox-like) approach to news coverage.
Months before he arrived, for example, a WTVT reporter parked a rented Ryder truck next to a federal building in downtown Tampa at the start of Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh's trial, to see if security here was prepared for a similar tactic. (WTVT was also criticized in January 1998 for using an 8-year-old child and fake signs to test if people paid attention to missing children posters; the stunt fell apart when the child was spotted by two unwitting Tampa police detectives.)
For Metlin, ratings success is about establishing traditions. "Channel 28 is clearly taking a more strident approach to newsgathering, and Channel 10 is trying to be almost maternal," said Metlin, who returned WTVT to a more traditional newscast emphasizing longtime anchors such as John Wilson and Kelly Ring.
"(Both stations) have to commit to it for years," Metlin said. "Are they going to stick with 'Action News' for five years until people become comfortable with it? Life Around the Bay ... will they stick with that? People are creatures of habit; they stick with what they're comfortable with."
That's a sentiment echoed by Leslie Spencer, a communications executive with Publix who left WTVT after 21 years as an anchor. "People don't warm up to anchors unless they have a history," she said. "They feel more comfortable if they know you ... if they've relied on you for news through a hurricane or another crisis. It's the difference between buying and renting: You may rent the trendy place, but you invest in something that stands the test of time."
Ratings for the first week the two new formats went head-to-head seemed to bear out Spencer's observations. They showed little change in the 5 p.m. hour among weekday newscasts during the week of Oct. 14, compared with the week before.
In overnight household ratings, WTSP's 5 p.m. ratings rose one-tenth of a percentage point during the week of Oct. 14, compared with the week before. WFTS' ratings were the same. During the week of Oct. 14, WTSP drew 4.4 percent of the market's households, and WFTS drew 2.3 percent; WFTS' household ratings were also the same for May's "sweeps" ratings period.
Overnight household ratings are not the same as ratings describing the gender and age of viewers (used to set advertising rates, those figures are available locally only after sweeps periods). Still, household ratings can indicate trends, including the slow pace of change among news viewers.
It's a curious competition: Action News in one corner, happy talk in another, two formats that hearken back to '70s-era strategies being advanced in a market where consistency is king (the top station, WFLA, is the only one that didn't change network affiliations during a huge shuffle in 1994).
"It's all about journalism plus trustworthiness and an understanding of the community you serve," Spencer said. "People here are not big on change. So you have to establish what your niche is going to be and stick with it."