Just wanting to know when TV shows started showing clips of Next Weeks Episode at the end of Today’s episode? What I mean is Next week on Criminal Minds people are missing who is it.
Don’t remember seeing this much if at all in the 1970’s, 1980’s, or most of the 1990’s. Have TV shows always done this, or is just something they have recently started and if so what year did they start doing this? Is this to get you to not make other arrangements so you will watch the show next week?
well you pretty much hit the nail on the head, it’s to try and get you to decide to watch the show next week.
TV shows started doing more ‘teasers’ for the next episode as the television airwaves started getting more and more crowded and competition increased. In the 70 and into the 80’s cable wasn’t as much, if any, competition for the Networks, but as the cable market grew to capture a bigger market share, the business started changing. Someone figured out that you could advertise ‘next weeks show’ to the best audience possible…the people watching this weeks show, and help guarantee that your audience would not shrink nearly as much over the course of a week. Remember that all of the other shows advertise and try and capture your attention away from the shows that you already watch. If you’ve already decided, while watching, say M.A.S.H. that next weeks show was a must-see, then the advertisers for the competitions shows effectiveness has dropped dramatically. It’s harder to change your mind after its been made up, than it is to influence you when you’ve not decided what to watch.
I wish I could remember when they started doing it, it’s a great question. Maybe someone reading this is in the TV Marketing world and can chime in.
I have to say that the current season of LOST has taken the ‘teaser’ to a whole new level. Kind of amazing really.
hope that helped.