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One-fifth of households in top markets watched Obama’s infomercial

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Sen. Barack Obama’s 30-minute political infomercial was watched by 21.7% of households in the top 56 local markets, Nielsen Media Research reported today.

That’s a little more than half the audience that tuned into the final debate between Obama and Sen. John McCain earlier this month.

Obama’s ad, which ran live on CBS, NBC, FOX, UNIVISION, MSNBC, and NY1, drew substantially more viewers than the series of 15 paid telecasts presidential candidate Ross Perot ran in 1992. An average of 11.6 million viewers watched those, just about 5% of the national audience. However, Perot’s final simulcast on election day drew 26 million viewers, or about 17% of all households.

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The city with the highest tune-in for Obama’s commercial was Baltimore, where 31.3% of households watched. Philadelphia was the second largest, with 29%, likely because many viewers were waiting for the conclusion of the final World Series game. In Los Angeles, 21.3% of households tuned into Obama’s ad.

-- Matea Gold

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