South African television viewing remains stable in total, although less people are watching SABC1, SABC2 and e.tv on a weekly basis, according to the latest All Media and Products Survey (AMPS) for January to December 2015.
The South African Advertising Research Foundation's (SAARF) latest AMPS figures were just released (which will also be its last of South Africa's largest national survey since it started in 1975).
While the Living Standard Measure (LSM) audience segmentation tool is largely outdated and will be replaced by some new, as yet unannounced currency, LSMs is still what basically everybody is the biz refers to and uses to make and track those elusive audiences and ad buys.
Despite a number of declines for individual TV channels in South Africa like SABC1, SABC2 and e.tv, television in total remained stable at 91.8%.
This is despite the decline in weekly viewership of three terrestrial TV channels, the total community TV sector, and a general loss of weekly TV viewers in the Western Cape.
e.tv's weekly viewing dropped from 67% to 65.1% - plunging due to a decline in viewers tuning out in large urban areas in specifically the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. e.tv viewership losses were seen across both males and females.
SABC1 likewise saw a drop in its weekly audience figures: down from 76.9% to 75.4%. SABC1 lost viewers in large urban areas and the Western Cape tuning out.
SABC2 also shed viewers with its weekly audience dropping from 72.1% to 70.4% - driven by losses in large urban areas, the Western Cape and Limpopo and female viewers tuning out.
Although at a lower percentage, SABC3's weekly audience remained stable at 55%, despite losing viewers in the Western Cape in the LSM8 to LSM 10 demographic - the wealthier viewers.
The weekly viewing of M-Net's terrestrial channel managed to remain stable at 6%.
Weekly audience levels for total community TV in South Africa dropped from 10.4% to 9.4%, due in part to losses in large urban areas and female viewers.
Viewership of Platco Digital's OpenView HD (OVHD) is growing. The weekly audience rose with audience numbers now at 195 000 per week, or 0.5% - up from 0.2% previously. This viewership increase comes from all community sizes, from the Western Cape and North West and from both more women and men turning in to the free-to-air satellite platform.
The total weekly audience of On Digital Media (ODM) and StarTimes Media South Africa's StarSat remained stable, although extremely small, at 0.6%.
Viewership of MultiChoice's DStv remained stable with an even weekly audience figure of 39.9%.
Interestingly, according to AMPS Dec 2015 only 1.4% of South Africans watch television online or over their cellphones per week.
