BBC lose youth audience to commercial rivals

The BBC has lost 18% of its youth audience since taking BBC3 off-air and turning it into an exclusive online channel via the iPlayer service.

Analysis by the TV marketing organisation Tinderbox has suggested that commercial rivals such as ITV2 (which snapped up the cult animation series Family Guy and American Dad following the decision to shutter BBC3) and E4 (home to the ever popular and rarely off-air Big Bang Theory) have benefited from the decision to pull the channel.

As well as catering to a number of niche (but still sizeable) audiences, BBC3 also provided a home to nurture new talent and take risks. The channel saw many of its early programmes catapult once obscure artists, including David Walliams and Matt Lucus (Little Britain) and Noel Fielding (The Mighty Boosh) into household names.

Prior to the switch-off, The BBC Trust warned the broadcaster that moving BBC3 online could lose the broadcaster an estimated 750,000 viewers who didn’t engage with any other BBC channel. They also suggested that the BBC would lose up to 5% of their black audience as well as seeing a reduction in female viewers from lower income families.

The real concern for the BBC, especially at a time when funding for the corporation is constantly under public scrutiny, must be how to win back this audience.

New laws regarding the watching of “catch-up” content on iPlayer and TV licence ownership may also further impact on the corporation’s youth audience. For example, how many student households will decide the £145 licence fee is worth it when they can access their entertainment via a number of alternative free and premium online channels?

If the BBC is no-longer relevant to an increasingly sizeable audience (regardless of demographics) it becomes harder to justify public funding via the TV licence fee.

Did the BBC cut off its nose to spite its face by taking BBC3 off-air and will the cost savings they made from the decision ultimately cost them money as they struggle to engage a new generation of viewers?