Fox Business seeking increase in ad rates

Fox Business Network plans to ask its advertisers for more money due to its higher ratings in the past year, writes Jeanine Poggi of Advertising Age.

Poggi writes, “Last June FBN moved the start of its programming to 5 a.m. from 6 a.m.; shifted Maria Bartiromo to the pre-market hours in place of Don Imus; added Neil Cavuto to daytime; and brought in Trish Regan for a new afternoon show.

“In November, FBN broke its own ratings records when it hosted its first presidential debate, a Republican primary brawl that delivered 13.5 million viewers. It followed that up in January with another GOP debate, which was watched by 11 million viewers.

“Over the first quarter of this year, the network’s total audience in the time period known as business day, from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., rose 111% from a year earlier to average 134,000 viewers. Its viewers in the 25-to-54 demographic that it sells to advertisers grew 130% to average 23,000.

“FBN has managed to narrow the gap with CNBC to within 30% during March business day among total viewers and the demo, FBN said, citing Nielsen numbers. And for the first time ever, FBN topped CNBC one day last week for both total viewers and the demo in business day.

“But the NBC Universal-owned channel still bests FBN on most days.”

Read more here.