Wendy van Dijk arouses incomprehension with her somewhat laconic reaction to the Ministars flopping. “What do you mean ‘sorry’? These kind of presenters should take an example from Ivo Niehe!”
It’s a curious reflex of TV stars: when asked about a television flop, they often say that those viewing figures are not important to them and that it was a lot of fun in the studio. They completely ignore the fact that they don’t make such a show for those few people in the studio, but for the masses at home.
Wendy’s flop fun
Wendy van Dijk said this week in front of the RTL Boulevard camera that she regrets that her SBS 6 show Ministars has flopped so mercilessly, but: “What I am making and doing, we have enjoyed that moment immensely.”
Very nice that Wendy is having such a nice time, but of course you don’t sell commercials on that. Moreover: it is not about Wendy at all, but about the people at home. Stupid, says former SBS boss Tina Nijkamp.
“What’s a pity?!”
Tina is always a bit annoyed by TV stars shrugging their shoulders at low ratings. She calls this in her weekly list of TV cases she finds ‘stupid’. “That presenters always think it’s a pity if something doesn’t score, but ‘fortunately it was a lot of fun to make, so it’s not a big deal’.”
What nonsense, says Tina, who incidentally does not mention Wendy’s name. “Perhaps those presenters can read the Volkskrant Magazine interview with Ivo Niehe. Then they know that success also has to do with passion.”
What does Ivo say?
Ivo Niehe does not make television because he likes it so much, but to enchant the viewer, he explains in de Volkskrant. “I always chose the TV Show guests for one thing: their crowd-pleasing quality.”
He continues: “Does it score? That was the guiding principle during the editorial meeting, because I set myself the requirement of one and a half to two million viewers at a time.”
Rating ritual
Ivo doesn’t shrug his shoulders when looking at the ratings. “I used to have a ritual for it, I made a kind of game out of it. I first looked at how much the other networks had at my broadcast time, and what the other networks had the week before, and then I calculated in my head how many viewers we would have.”
Those were always ten tense minutes, he continues. “I was rid of that until Ivo started to score on Sunday. We now attract 700,000 viewers, including two reruns, comparable to Jinek. So now I can’t resist that ritual again.”
