Operation Ana Rosa does not save Telecinco

Since Telecinco lost its lead as the most watched television channel in Spain in 2022, the channel has been making some not always gentle changes to try to reconnect with viewers. One of its flagships has been Ana Rosa Quintana, who was placed first in the afternoons and, suddenly, returned this February to the morning slots where she made the bulk of her career. This return to its origins has worked well, in terms of audience, for the channel, although the joys are, however, slight quantitatively and, in addition, point to some problems.

At the moment, Ana Rosa is doing well in the mornings, but not enough to turn the tables or pose a threat to Antena 3's leadership in Spain. In the weeks she has been on the programme in this slot, she has achieved an average 13.8% audience share. Comparing this with the data from January is not automatic, because in her current time slot (09:00-12:15h) there were then two programmes. On the one hand, Let's see (10.30-13.30h), which had a 13.5% and, therefore, three tenths have been gained here (especially in the early hours). The other Telecinco programme was The critical gaze (08.30-10.30h) which then only scored 11.2% and, therefore, the benefit here is obvious, three points more. However, this slot has now been relegated to the difficult eight to nine in the morning slot, which has harmed it greatly, since it barely manages 8.8% with this new time slot.

In any case, the audiences are still unstable and have a variation of three points between the minimum and maximum of each day, although there is no marked upward or downward trend. However, from the point of view of influence, Ana Rosa has lost it, as was to be expected taking into account that there are fewer viewers in the mornings. Specifically, with its last month in the afternoons it had an average of 750,000 viewers, while now it barely gathers 328,000.

A timid rise

By stripes, recover Ana Rosa's program in the mornings has allowed Telecinco to climb positions in the ranking of the morning slot (07.00-14.00h). In January it was the fourth option, with 10.2%, below Antena 3 (12.0%), La1 (11.0%) and La Sexta (10.3%). On the other hand, during the four weeks in which the presenter has been the one to greet the channel, Mediaset's first channel has climbed one position and is now in bronze, with 11.2%, just one tenth of a point away from second place, a position occupied by La Sexta with 11.3%, and increasingly closer to 12.5%, which allows it 13.1%.

In Catalonia, however, Telecinco remains stuck in fifth place. La Sexta leads the ranking in February and early March (13.0%), followed by TV3 (11.8%), Antena 3 (8.4%), La1 (8.3%) and Telecinco (6.9%), which loses three tenths compared to January.

Despite the overall improvement in Mediaset's figures, in Spain, Susanna Griso has not been particularly affected by the arrival of her historic rival in the mornings. Thus, the programme Public Mirror, on Antena 3, achieved a 13.4% audience share in February, which is only one tenth less than the 13.5% achieved in January. And if we focus on the overall data for each channel, counting all hours of the day, we can see that Mediaset has not achieved the boost it was looking for: in the latest monthly ranking, corresponding to February, Antena 3 was still more than three points ahead of its archrival: 12.8% against 9.6%. In addition, La1 remains in second position with 10.5%.

Change in the afternoons

To complete the analysis, we should see if dressing up the saint of the morning has meant undressing the saint of the afternoon. This is not the case, on the contrary. TardeAR, when it was presented by Ana Rosa, achieved an average of 8.9% in January, while the duo of new presenters, Frank Blanco and Verónica Dulante, has achieved a slight improvement in the data, with 9.1% of share

Mediaset, however, is not happy with the afternoon slot, as it does not achieve double digits with TardeAR, nor with the contest Reacción en cadena –especially since it lost the contestants known as Mozos de Arousa– nor with Jorge Javier's diary. For the moment, a week ago it exchanged two of the spaces in its schedule, so now TardeAR starts at 3:30 p.m. and lasts three hours, at which time it connects with Jorge Javier Vázquez's witness program, which runs until eight in the evening to hand over to the contest.

This first week with the inverted order has not gone especially well. TardeAR has maintained these days the 9.1% that it also achieved later in the afternoon, but The diary jumps from 8.4% to 9.1% with the new configuration.