Nielsen just measures audience. It does not “help” stations. There are known techniques for programmers to increase listening, but those are programming tactics and not provided by Nielsen .
No, they don’t. Talk networks rely on those categories and the ubiquitous My Pillow. But local revenue is quite diverse, from car dealers to insurance agents. Many local accounts don’t look at ratings as a primary indicator… they look át what their customers or potential customers use. So 55 and over is not a negative ther and they can do very well despite agency dictates.
No, it only alters it for scofflaws. The rest of us do nothing different
And, despite 40 years of reviewing diaries at Arbitron, I never saw evidence of that. With the PPM you don’t vote anyway as the device hears what you hear.
Fun thing one can do on a road trip is go to that arch in Kearney, Nebraska, and get to the part where there is still an active speed-gun out there. I can confirm that most people don't change their driving habits, however there is the chance they don't even realize it is right above them.
But how often does that happen to a WSB or KFI? Where there is a good PD there is discipline and team spirit, not loose cannons.
I have to be honest that I haven't listened to either station at night, unless they are covering a game. Obviously I'm in the Sports Hub's market. I am able to pick up WFAN-AM at night.
Although long ago, I would put the Dennis and Calahan incident on WEEI in that category, when there was a gorilla that escaped from a Boston zoo.
I wanted to know how I can get my radio station listening measured by Neilson.
You can't. Nielsen does a random sample of persons in each radio market and invite them to participate. You can not offer to participate or join a group that does that.
That's insane! Lol.
Respectfully, how do you know that "What radio companies are doing now is what gets them the most listeners?" Have radio companies tried every possible method to gain more listeners? Might there be strategies that haven't even been imagined?
I got my once-in-a-lifetime chance when Hartford was still a diary market. I was delighted to have a chance, then incredibly depressed when I saw the ratings period I was to record. All but two days of it would be spent on vacation -- in another radio market. Knowing even then that my listening to Boston stations wouldn't count in the Boston ratings or the Hartford ratings, I sent the book back with notations only of the XM satellite channels I listened to, figuring that where I was when I listened to those couldn't be known to Arbitron (as it was known then).
While deep research has been more limited during the pandemic, stations and owner groups do rather deep research when there is a need for a new format unless there is a very obvious format hole in the market.
It's not insane, it is "practical". Stations only pay for as big a sample of listeners as needed to satisfy the mostly agency accounts that buy radio advertising based on ratings. The process is very, very expensive so the samples (the number of persons participating in each survey period) is limited by pure economics.
We have argued this ad nauseum in the past, but I would like to respond. Most markets have 1-3 radio companies, and most of the top 100 markets are dominated by iHeart and/or Audacy. Can you provide evidence that these "hundreds of radio companies" are "doing different things?" I see no evidence. This is what I see:
