'Oprah' Is Attracting Young, Female Viewers

The Wall Street Journal reports:

More than a year after the pan-Arab satellite station MBC started broadcasting "Oprah" on its channel 4, it made a discovery: The show's ratings were higher than those of any other English-language show. The interest was coming from an untapped audience in the largest country in their coverage area: young Saudi Arabian women. And what these young women wanted was even more "Oprah," as well as other programs like it.

"We found 'Oprah' to be the biggest hit with our viewers," says Andrew Maskall, marketing manager for MBC2 and 4, which are based in nearby Dubai. "It helped us identify a commercial gap in the market." Almost a third of Saudi Arabia's population of 26 million people is women under the age of 25 years old. MBC4's target audience is 18- to 25-year-olds.

Oprah rules.