A great batch of new classical radio research came out from Walrus Research in June. You’ve probably seen it already, but I’d love to hear your comments on it. This is an update to the research done in 2008, and it’s based on the new Arbitron data collection via Portable People Meters (ppp).
Here’s the link to the 2011 report.
Some highlights:
Of all the major classical stations in the country (in the study) only three commercial stations are left standing. The others are all public stations, including two that were commercial at the time of the study but have since gone public: KING-FM in Seattle, and KDFC in San Francisco. And of all the conclusions in the report, this may be the one that stations are most interested in:
The way to build listener income for classical music stations is to build public service – extending the reach of the station while maintaining the relatively strong core composition of their audience.
Individual giving is the largest single source of support for most public radio stations. Individual giving provides a larger share of revenue for public radio’s music stations than for news stations and news/music stations.
The research points to some outstanding-producing stations, including that of KQAC in Portland, managed by my partner in blogging, Jack Allen. It also discusses some of the factors that contribute to high listenership, among them the level of education of our audience members.
I always hate it when speakers put up Power Point slides and then proceed to read them to you, so I won’t restate what you can read for yourself, but it does make some interesting reading. Even more interesting would be to hear from you about your firsthand experience on the ground.
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Thanks for sharing this report, Marty…its conclusions regarding Loyalty and Core Audience are especially noteworthy. Here’s to activistic Monks!
-Robert Ready
There are two other factors which I believe influence listeners choices. The major one is the kind of classical music that a station plays. I happen to be in Boston, but prefer WETA because I like the kind of music list they put together: lots of classical favorites. A lesser influence is the personality of the host. I happen to particularly like John Chester in the afternoon on WETA and John Spurgeon in the mornings on WQXR and tend to listen to those stations rather than my local one.
The most interesting conclusion of the study is that public classical stations do better with individual listeners than public news/talk outlets.
However, this study was a snapshot of the industry in the summer of 2010. Summer is traditionally a lower listening period for classical stations. While the study shows WCLV with a 1.2 share, during the past months of 2011, WCLV bounced betwee 1.5 to 1.7 to 1.6. Over the PPM reign, our shares have usually been 1.5 or higher.
Most classical stations are in the lowr quadrant of the rankings, where there are fewer PPM reports, hence more chance for fluctuation. It really becomes the luck of the draw. I;m sure that from month to more that 20,000 listeners to WCLV do not suddenly stop or start listening to WCLV, or 50,000 listeners come or go from WQXR.
The study does not address the affect of coverage. It is odd that WRR and WFMT, both with flame thrower power and coverage, traditionally have lower ratings than WCLV, a Class A station. Also, note that WCRB in Boston, which has a poorer signal than its owner, WGBH, has had higher ratings than WGBH for the period it has been a member of the WGBH family. Maybe programming has something to do with it.
And there’s the general acknowledgement in the business that PPM is not good technology or methodology for niche audience stations.