Raw Rating: Key metrics including yet another huge drop from first hour to third with a good eight-week stat in mix (w/Keller’s Analysis)

Monday night’s episode of WWE Raw on USA Network drew a 1.96 rating among live and same-night-DVR viewers, down from the 2.03 the week before. It started with 3.102 million viewers in the first hour, in line with the 2017 average of 3.140 million. The third hour didn’t perform well, though, dipping 585,000 viewers from the first hour average. The 2.517 million viewers in the third hour was below the 2017 average of 2.895 million viewers.

The ten week rolling average for the rating headed into this week was 2.00, so this week’s was slightly below that. The 2017 average is 2.09. The Raw rating one year ago this week was 1.88. Raw has beat year-ago numbers six of the last eight weeks since Labor Day.

Keller’s Analysis: The dropoff for the third hour last week was 775,000, seemingly an aberration due to competition on other channels and a weak hook to keep viewers. This week, the dropoff of 585,000 was way more than double the 2017 average, which is ominous and not inevitable  They presented a Women’s Title match without a single interview from the challenger or anything more than passive plugs by announcers going into commercial breaks. WWE needs to build up their final matches with some context so viewers feel invested in seeing the match live and watching the reactions of the winner and loser. What’s at stake? How do fans feel about the potential outcomes? Do they care to see the emotions after a win or loss for both competitors? Does the hype set up the match as being important in the historical ongoing narrative of WWE?

WWE gets focused on a storyline with Survivor Series and Under Siege and thinks it can just toss out a title match main event and not do the job of promoting it instead of just presenting it. And they’re paying a price. That first hour is a chance for WWE to convince viewers they need to be sure they are watching the last 30 minutes of the show because they’ve invested in seeing the outcome of the main event. WWE is awful at this right now and taking for granted that viewership will be what it will be. If bragging on Twitter about record quarterly revenues was tied to actually convincing their viewers to watch Raw to the end, they’d be more proactive, but the TV rights fees that are boosting their gross revenues are tied to a TV deal made years ago based on ratings generated years ago, and it’s not reflective of or a bragging point for the job they’re doing now, week to week, convincing their viewers that their live show on a top cable network is worth watching start to finish.