Did Syfy "damage" SGU's chances of success??

[Gatefan1976]

Ok
Keep it nice and discuss the points not the poster.

Personally, I feel they did all they could, yet I know that point is in dispute by some.
Just some of my own observations about this.

Being a more expensive show, Syfy may well have had to put it on in the winter(?) in order to have a better chance of a larger audience and to potentially make more off the adverts.

Friday night was the traditional "stargate" night, yet it still lost ratings relatively quickly in that timeslot. At that point they either had the option to keep it there, or move it to another night with even greater potential for profit or a greater *potential* pool of viewers.

Advertising, well, not being in the US, I'll let you guys "shoot that one out"

So, bearing in mind that NO company makes a product to loose money, what did or didn't Syfy do and what could it have done better?

[KEK]

Being a more expensive show, Syfy may well have had to put it on in the winter(?) in order to have a better chance of a larger audience and to potentially make more off the adverts.

Seems highly unlikely given that BSG was a more expensive show, yet it aired at the same time of year as SG-1 and Atlantis.

At that point they either had the option to keep it there, or move it to another night with even greater potential for profit or a greater *potential* pool of viewers.

The potential viewers were dwarfed by the increased competition. If they had left it on a Friday however, it would have gained a lead-in which typically attracts over 3 million viewers.

Advertising, well, not being in the US, I'll let you guys "shoot that one out"

It's virtually all posted in the promo videos thread. It's not just bad, it's misleading. I can't imagine anyone seeing it would have guessed that the show was a character drama, least of all a relatively slow paced one.

So, bearing in mind that NO company makes a product to loose money,

True, though the first season agreement did have a mechanism by which meeting certain ratings would guarantee a second season. If (and it's a big if I admit) the second season had a similar agreement in place for a potential third, you could see why they might potentially want to kill it. It's all guesswork and speculation and I won't argue that it's the case, but at the same time I wouldn't be surprised if it was.

what did or didn't Syfy do and what could it have done better?

In short, more appropriate promotion and better scheduling. Both of which were dire in my opinion.

I'm not blaming the shows relatively narrow appeal on them of course, but I do believe there is a larger audience out there for it than Syfy helped it find, and I do believe that had they done better on their end that the show would have had more success than it has done, even if it would still have been less than SG-1 or Atlantis.

[Hyndara71]

Mh, intersting thread, GF!
I would say, the only failure SyFy (?) did was to announce the greenlight of SGU only a day after SGAs not renewal. That was poor handled. On the other hand I can understand the reason behind this step.
Like you I cannot speak how the handling of advertising in US is, German SyFy do it a lot - ways too much for my own taste. You cannot watch this network without a SGU-trailer per hour at the moment (just the opposite, the 2nd season of Warehouse 13 will be shown next month and SyFy do not advertise that show here).

SyFy (US) bought Smackdown for the Friday's timeslot and something had to change. The network was in trouble at that time and SGU was bleeding viewers from the first episodes. But Stargate was a strong franchise before SGU happened and SyFy did what they thought would be the best and changed the night in hope that the show would do better on another night. A night, SyFy knew at that point, V was doing good. So, another understandable reason for the change of the night.
(besides, I've read a lot in the SGU folders in the time SyFy announced the change and there were a lot of welcoming because of this decision here)
So, no, I don't see a failure (besides the ordering of SGU instead of SGA) from SyFy.

[KEK]

Mh, intersting thread, GF!
I would say, the only failure SyFy (?) did was to announce the greenlight of SGU only a day after SGAs not renewal. That was poor handled. On the other hand I can understand the reason behind this step.
Like you I cannot speak how the handling of advertising in US is, German SyFy do it a lot - ways too much for my own taste. You cannot watch this network without a SGU-trailer per hour at the moment (just the opposite, the 2nd season of Warehouse 13 will be shown next month and SyFy do not advertise that show here).

SyFy (US) bought Smackdown for the Friday's timeslot and something had to change. The network was in trouble at that time and SGU was bleeding viewers from the first episodes. But Stargate was a strong franchise before SGU happened and SyFy did what they thought would be the best and changed the night in hope that the show would do better on another night. A night, SyFy knew at that point, V was doing good. So, another understandable reason for the change of the night.
(besides, I've read a lot in the SGU folders in the time SyFy announced the change and there were a lot of welcoming because of this decision here)
So, no, I don't see a failure (besides the ordering of SGU instead of SGA) from SyFy.

Few points:

I don't think anyone is suggesting that Syfy didn't promote the show enough, they're disputing the quality of the promotion, not the quantity.

Syfy as a network isn't in trouble, and hasn't been for a long time. It's on the up, if anything.

V doesn't do well on Tuesdays. It got renewed by the skin of it's teeth, and it if gets a third season that will be another minor miracle.

[Hyndara71]

Few points:

I don't think anyone is suggesting that Syfy didn't promote the show enough, they're disputing the quality of the promotion, not the quantity.

Sure? I've read a lot about not enough advertising on these boards.

Syfy as a network isn't in trouble, and hasn't been for a long time. It's on the up, if anything.

As far as I know nearly every network was in some trouble over the past years. SyFy lost viewers before SGU premieres. It's true, it never was in such trouble as MGM was but SyFy had to reorganize itself.

V doesn't do well on Tuesdays. It got renewed by the skin of it's teeth, and it if gets a third season that will be another minor miracle.

Don't know where you get your numbers from. Sure, for ABC the ratings are still low but as far as I know V had first lost viewers and later in the season some came back. Agree with you if these small tickup will be enough to get a third season. But V still got much better numbers than SGU.

[Hyndara71]

The potential viewers were dwarfed by the increased competition. If they had left it on a Friday however, it would have gained a lead-in which typically attracts over 3 million viewers

In which galaxy? The reason to put SGU on another timeslot and another day was the continuing lost of viewers on fridays. There weren't 3 million, no chance. Look at Sanctuary and cut their numbers to a half. That could be the possible rating for SGU on a Friday night.

[KEK]

In which galaxy? The reason to put SGU on another timeslot and another day was the continuing lost of viewers on fridays. There weren't 3 million, no chance.

I said the show would have had a 3 million+ lead-in show, which it would have, which Sanctuary had instead.

Look at Sanctuary and cut their numbers to a half. That could be the possible rating for SGU on a Friday night.

Based on... what?

[Gatefan1976]

Seems highly unlikely given that BSG was a more expensive show, yet it aired at the same time of year as SG-1 and Atlantis.

True, but as soon as the ratings for BSG dropped down to the kind of ratings SGU was getting on Fidays in S3, they (RDM) did make a last ditch deal to get S4 to close out the series. TBPH, I don't know if adverts have "seasonal" prices, but it wouldn't suprise me if they did. Perhaps S4 NBSG burnt them and they were interested in making sure they didn't get burnt again?

The potential viewers were dwarfed by the increased competition. If they had left it on a Friday however, it would have gained a lead-in which typically attracts over 3 million viewers.

Well, how many people who watch WWE also watch SGU? I know of about 3 or 4 on here (including myself) out of some 40-50 constant SGU posters? (of course some might not say they watch it as WWE cosidering how heavily it gets "bashed") Thats hardly a good "crossover conversion" rate As to a lead in, BH is pretty heavy on the drama itself and still it doesn't "pull" alot of crossover viewers, and the difference between the two for Seizure is pretty huge.

It's virtually all posted in the promo videos thread. It's not just bad, it's misleading. I can't imagine anyone seeing it would have guessed that the show was a character drama, least of all a relatively slow paced one.

So you would prepose advertising less focussed on "action" and more on "drama"?? Do you think that would have made a significant difference? It already had a problem off the bat using the Stargate name because (not to devolve into an argument) using a "brand name" comes with certain expectations and stargate has traditionally been "action adventure", not "Character Drama".

True, though the first season agreement did have a mechanism by which meeting certain ratings would guarantee a second season. If (and it's a big if I admit) the second season had a similar agreement in place for a potential third, you could see why they might potentially want to kill it. It's all guesswork and speculation and I won't argue that it's the case, but at the same time I wouldn't be surprised if it was.

OK, I can buy the structure agreement, but again, why wouldn't they want SGU to succeed? It's hardly in thier interest to see thier product fail is it? For that scenario to work, Syfy would have had to deliberatly tank the advertising, tank the timeslot, Tank MGM, Tank Brad and hurt themselves? I can't see any business entity going to such lengths when all they had to do was to say "sorry, not interested" from the get go. Also, if they were willing to enter into such an arangement with TPTB, don't you think they wanted it to succeed?

In short, more appropriate promotion and better scheduling. Both of which were dire in my opinion.

I'm not blaming the shows relatively narrow appeal on them of course, but I do believe there is a larger audience out there for it than Syfy helped it find, and I do believe that had they done better on their end that the show would have had more success than it has done, even if it would still have been less than SG-1 or Atlantis.

Fair enough.

[KEK]

Well, how many people who watch WWE also watch SGU? I know of about 3 or 4 on here (including myself) out of some 40-50 constant SGU posters? (of course some might not say they watch it as WWE cosidering how heavily it gets "bashed") Thats hardly a good "crossover conversion" rate

I'd say potentially 10% of 3 million is pretty good. And when you factor in the less competitive Friday slot, I think the change (or non change as the case would be) could have been quite significant.

So you would prepose advertising less focussed on "action" and more on "drama"?? Do you think that would have made a significant difference?

I do yes. Potentially a huge one. When people are expecting an action adventure and get a character drama instead, I think the only people you hold on to in the long run are those that like both. As those that only wanted an action adventure are disappointed and leave, and those that only wanted a character drama didn't tune in in the first place.

It already had a problem off the bat using the Stargate name because (not to devolve into an argument) using a "brand name" comes with certain expectations and stargate has traditionally been "action adventure", not "Character Drama".

I agree. I'd have named it Destiny instead to further avoid the stigma, but I don't suppose that was up to Syfy so I didn't mention it.

OK, I can buy the structure agreement, but again, why wouldn't they want SGU to succeed? It's hardly in thier interest to see thier product fail is it? For that scenario to work, Syfy would have had to deliberatly tank the advertising, tank the timeslot, Tank MGM, Tank Brad and hurt themselves? I can't see any business entity going to such lengths when all they had to do was to say "sorry, not interested" from the get go. Also, if they were willing to enter into such an arangement with TPTB, don't you think they wanted it to succeed?

Certainly they wanted it to succeed when it launched, whether they wanted to risk a third season of a show with falling ratings after they'd seen the first season's run is debatable. When I say they *might* have tried to kill it, I was meaning more with the move to Tuesday than anything else. But like I said, I'm not really arguing that this was the case, I'm only throwing it out there. It's all just speculation.

[jelgate]

Don't know where you get your numbers from. Sure, for ABC the ratings are still low but as far as I know V had first lost viewers and later in the season some came back. Agree with you if these small tickup will be enough to get a third season. But V still got much better numbers than SGU.

That is incorrect. V's numbers have been pretty steady all of S2 where the S1 finale ended up. As for SyFy maybe part to blame. I'm not of a mind it was one factor. All these excuses people make I think are valid and it was the total combination that ended SGU

[Tanith0709]

But V still got much better numbers than SGU.

And every other show on the Syfy channel, as well as most shows on a cable network.

[EdenSG]

A few thoughts I would like to add to the conversation...

I agree with Hyndara that the way SGA was cancelled and the way SGU being announced the very next day was very poorly handled - the whole fiasco really did not do SGU any favors. I also think assuring fans that there would be a follow-up movie for SGA then saying (at least initially) they would get to it once SGU was up and running did not help either - by the time they could get to it MGM was essentially bankrupt and not able to fund the movies.

In fact I would not be surprised if the lack of an SGA movie ticked Syfy off as well. According to reports, running the SGA movie, as well as SG1's AoT and Cont., was part of their plan for keeping the franchise vital on their network and part of their plan to keep a year round SG presence on the channel. In my opinion if Syfy's plan was to offer something for all SG fans and keep the franchise on their channel strong by having the SG1 movies and then the SGA movie perhaps Syfy (and thus SGU and SG in general) was screwed by not having the SGA movie made.

I don't think keeping it on Fridays would have saved SGU - it had already lost too many viewers - they had to find a way to build an audience. Their reasoning for moving it was likely based on several things-

1. Lets say the choice was to leave Sanctuary or SGU on Fridays. Sanctuary, while not getting blockbuster ratings, was maintaining its viewers on Friday night, SGU was losing viewers. It is always a risk to move a show, you could end up gaining or losing viewers - so which show to take the risk with? If you move Sanctuary you risk losing viewers for a well established show that is maintaining its ratings and if you keep SGU on Friday you risk losing more viewers (and the trend was there to reasonably believe it would continue to lose viewers) - both shows lose. So do you take a risk with 2 shows or take a risk with one showl? I think they made the reasonable choice to move SGU.

2. I think the intent was always to keep SGU on in the Fall. SGU is an expensive show that was touted as a high end production, had well known mainstream actors, marketed as having a darker, more edgy, contemporary feel and supposed to carry the mantle of the franchise to a new audience- it was more than reasonable to have the expectation that it would do well in the Fall. Summer is typically for lighter fair, viewership goes down in the summer, people viewing habits are more haphazard because of vacations, parties, going out etc. - thus making it harder for a serialized show to grow an audience. So I really have my doubts that SGU would have done well during the summer.

In addition, Syfy could have felt that there was precedent for SG doing well in the Fall; the last 10 eps of SGA ran during the Fall -(on fridays so it is a bit comparing apples and oranges) - but the last 10 eps rated higher than the first 10 eps of season 5 that ran during the summer.

3. I think another reason Syfy chose to move it off Friday is that fewer SG fans were watching. Yes, Friday is known as SG Fridays on Syfy - but SG fans were not sticking around to watch SGU on Fridays. Syfy might have concluded if SGU was not retaining the SG fans/audience on Fridays, then it had to look for a new audience on a different night. I am not sure the audience for Wrestling was one that would be expected to hang around for SGU - maybe for Santurary. The demos would likely tell us that, none of us have the demo breakdowns for those shows - Syfy would and that would weigh into Syfy's decision - Not an unreasonable thought.

All this talk about marketing and blaming Syfy - has any one considered that it was MGM's job to do the heavy marketing of SGU and not Syfy? Syfy might have been responsible for marketing on their own channel but I bet you as the owner, production company and holder of the rights to all things SG that MGM had a big part in the marketing for outside the network. There were full page ads for SGU in Entertainment Weekly - who placed those ads? My guess is MGM. I think because of MGM's financial problems, they were not able to market SGU very well. I would not blame Syfy for this - in fact I bet Syfy was pretty annoyed by the fact that MGM was not in a financial position to support the show.

But in the end this entire discussion is based on hindsight. I don't think Syfy wanted SGU to fail - why pay tens of millions for a show and not want it to do well? I think there are a whole lot of reasons why SGU did not succeed past two seasons, and Syfy is the very least of those reasons.

[Calluna]

I do yes. Potentially a huge one. When people are expecting an action adventure and get a character drama instead, I think the only people you hold on to in the long run are those that like both. As those that only wanted an action adventure are disappointed and leave, and those that only wanted a character drama didn't tune in in the first place.

Well it might have helped but "slow paced character dramas" are exremely difficult to advertise well, especially on a place called Syfy. Even Caprica's promos showed what little action there was in the series, and that came from a franchise where they traditionally focused on more character drama than Stargate anyway. I'm just not sure you'd ever have attracted the crowd currently enjoying "The Killing" on AMC now for example with a name like "Stargate Universe" no matter how well advertised. and I have to say, I don't think the writing is up to that either.

For what it's worth I liked the early promos with the confusion and crashing through the gate. I really disliked the promo poster with Scott running to nothing with a semi naked looking TJ and what looks like random abstract patterns standing in for the gate.

I'm really not talking about quality of the actual shows or anything but this tells you exactly what to expect:

SGA S1 promo poster
Vs
SGU promo poster

From that I don't think anyone who was a non SG fan would have the slightest clue what the show might be like, actiob/drama/space or anything.

ETA:

There were full page ads for SGU in Entertainment Weekly - who placed those ads? My guess is MGM. I think because of MGM's financial problems, they were not able to market SGU very well. I would not blame Syfy for this - in fact I bet Syfy was pretty annoyed by the fact that MGM was not in a financial position to support the show.

Ah, likely a lot of it was MGM then. But I maybe disagree that MGM didn't support the show financially. Someone created those really nice glossy press packs and funded posters put up in Times Square and expensive viewing parties etc, I remember there was a huge amount for a Stargate show, whether Syfy or MGM and whether it was effective or not.


But anyway, I do think it was the show itself that was the problem, not Syfy. Because the numbers premiered high but then subsequently plummeted around the world in pretty much the same pattern, no matter what station, timslot or day of the week. Summer might have helped but I wouldn't have thought by huge amounts, since it did debut well enough in Oct, it was the fact that it continually bled that was the problem.

[EdenSG]

Well it might have helped but "slow paced character dramas" are exremely difficult to advertise well, especially on a place called Syfy. Even Caprica's promos showed what little action there was in the series, and that came from a franchise where they traditionally focused on more character drama than Stargate anyway. I'm just not sure you'd ever have attracted the crowd currently enjoying "The Killing" on AMC now for example with a name like "Stargate Universe" no matter how well advertised. and I have to say, I don't think the writing is up to that either.

For what it's worth I liked the early promos with the confusion and crashing through the gate. I really disliked the promo poster with Scott running to nothing with a semi naked looking TJ and what looks like random abstract patterns standing in for the gate.

I'm really not talking about quality of the actual shows or anything but this tells you exactly what to expect:

SGA S1 promo poster
Vs
SGU promo poster

From that I don't think anyone who was a non SG fan would have the slightest clue what the show might be like, actiob/drama/space or anything.

ETA:

Ah, likely a lot of it was MGM then. But I maybe disagree that MGM didn't support the show financially. Someone created those really nice glossy press packs and funded posters put up in Times Square and expensive viewing parties etc, I remember there was a huge amount for a Stargate show, whether Syfy or MGM and whether it was effective or not.


But anyway, I do think it was the show itself that was the problem, not Syfy. Because the numbers premiered high but then subsequently plummeted around the world in pretty much the same pattern, no matter what station, timslot or day of the week. Summer might have helped but I wouldn't have thought by huge amounts, since it did debut well enough in Oct, it was the fact that it continually bled that was the problem.

I have to agree with you on all accounts.

I had forgotten about the press kits and billboards etc. - yes they were very nice and very bold, that would have likely been MGM (not sure about the press kits). There was a lot of publicity when SGU first came out. Not much this season which is what I think some people have an issue with, but that is not unuual for a second season. As you said think the quality of adverts may have been part of the issue - those SGU/SGA posters are interesting. SGA also had a center, double page ad in USA news when it first premeired - featuring the gate underwater - it was very nice.

[thekillman]

for SGA that poster screams "mystery. intrige." it raises questions. "is that atlantis? where is it? it looks awesome. is it awesome?"

the SGU poster screams "run" and the questions it raises are "why are they running?"