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Columbus October PPM

N

Nu_Roo_2

Pretty much status quo. In terms of share, most stations are about where they were either last month or the month before.

WTVN did bump up again for the second month in a row 3.8->4.1->4.6, though they're still pretty low compared to their historical shares.

103.9 Jack-FM stayed at .8. This is despite their cume increasing by more than 40%, from 73,100 to 104, 600. They need to turn that cume into higher TSL. If a substantial portion of the new cume came in near the end of the month, that alone might portend a share increase next month if people give it a preset. WHOK-FM has about the same cume, but a 1.4 share.
 
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WTVN is still a full share + down from spring. And fall traditionally is their strong suit. But yes, they have made a bit of a rebound from their historic low. Again, would love to know where the erosion began and continues.
 
Gotta love my MNI and YTS! (Actually, I really do love my YTS, but it's a different one. With Lou Reed's recent passing, we'll be featuring the Velvet Underground and the Verlaines on "Yesterday's Top Secrets" starting November 14.)
 
The strategy's working; at least it got you guys to post something here. Nothing's worse than the entire Columbus forum laying dormant for days at a time.
 
del_griffith said:
WTVN is still a full share + down from spring. And fall traditionally is their strong suit. But yes, they have made a bit of a rebound from their historic low. Again, would love to know where the erosion began and continues.
Click to expand...

In addition to some of the obvious things that have been discussed, I wonder there's another reason for WTVN tanking in the ratings. I have a theory that it's like how you never see a McDonald's alone ... usually all their competitors are in the same area. When the competitors all leave (like what has happened at Eastland and on Brice Road), the last businesses standing also die.

With WTVN being the only big station left on AM, I wonder if kind of the same thing is going on here. WOSU being on the AM at least gave AM some critical mass. With WOSU's abandonment of their AM signal, effectively WTVN is the last remaining big box store on Brice Road.

Does this make any sense to you? I notice there isn't much interesting to flip through on my AM presets anymore. If you have only one station worth going to on the AM dial, does that make you less likely to go there? Does this mean that CC should have bought the 820 signal instead of letting it go to St. Gabriel?
 
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I still wonder if WTVN isn't down as much as it looks, how many people switched from listening to the station on 610 to the far better sounding 93.3 HD 2. or if thats not available I Heart radio.

do those options even show up in the ratings we see.

I have always felt that if the ratings we as bad as they look in the public numbers CC would have made changes at WTVN. at least more cuts since they have a smaller audience now why keep as much local as they have. that is not the CC way.
 
I believe the HD2 numbers would show up in the share exceeded .05, and assuming CC encodes that signal for PPM -- which I would imagine they do. HD2 penetration is still really tiny.
 
HD does show up in the ratings in some markets, but Nielsen doesn't break out what portion of this listening comes from FM transalators of HD multicasts. I would guess that the overwhelming portion of listening in such multicasts is supplied by the translators. When I said HD2 reach is really tiny I meant on HD receivers.
 
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My understanding is PPM measures what the encoder is feeding the signal. If the HD-2 feed on 93.3 is encoded with 610, then any PPM is going to count the result at WTVN AM.

The last store standing is an interesting theory. And there may be some element of truth to that. Although the migration away was while there was still a lot stores still open on AM street. So that's not the full explanation for WTVN nose diving.

And all is not lost on the AM band. I am not Catholic nor seeking religious programming, but I will sometimes listen to 820 because it's something different. And WLW remains a force on the dial. And 1230 has the Fox sports feed that sometimes is interesting. And I enjoy most of the music on WMNI. And I listen to the Indians on WBNS AM and my dial would stay on AM except for the the interference and reduced signals at night. And that extends to the AM signals in general. I hate going into the store with a full signal and coming back to night time ingress. That's one reason my AM listening has decreased though the years.
 
del griffith said:
The last store standing is an interesting theory. And there may be some element of truth to that. Although the migration away was while there was still a lot stores still open on AM street. So that's not the full explanation for WTVN nose diving.
Click to expand...

I agree, but I would bet that Andersons and JCPenney Outlet's sales were a lot higher when Meijer, Target and all the other big boxes were around on Brice Rd. The collection of stores draws traffic and it lifts everybody else up. Think of everybody migrating over to Ohio 256 as the same as moving over to FM, not to mention that like FM, 256 is a lot higher quality venue!

del griffith said:
And all is not lost on the AM band. I am not Catholic nor seeking religious programming, but I will sometimes listen to 820 because it's something different. And WLW remains a force on the dial. And 1230 has the Fox sports feed that sometimes is interesting. And I enjoy most of the music on WMNI. And I listen to the Indians on WBNS AM and my dial would stay on AM except for the the interference and reduced signals at night. And that extends to the AM signals in general. I hate going into the store with a full signal and coming back to night time ingress. That's one reason my AM listening has decreased though the years.
Click to expand...

I agree to some extent. WMNI actually plays some cool tunes and I am a big fan of 820 AM, depending on my mood. I really enjoy the teaching programs where they tell you about what the bible says and explain it to you and give you some historical background. I'm not a holy-roller by any means, but it is interesting stuff. WHTH and WLOH are also on my presets, crappy signals and all.

THAT SAID, for a channel flipper like me, AM leaves a lot to be desired these days. (My presets are 610, 700, 790, 820, ??? and 1320). Not much interesting there if you don't like what's on 610 and you like news and information. My FM presets are great ... FM1 for music and FM2 for News/Public Radio (89.7, 90.5, WOUB I think, 97.1, 98.9 and 101.1). On second thought, maybe the channel flipping isn't so great there either, but for some reason it's more satisfying.

I agree about the static and the night patterns, btw. A few weeks ago, I was making a late night Kroger run and they had Peter Schiff on Coast to Coast. Very interesting personality - basically talking about doom and gloom for the dollar and for our economy. Some of it you have to take with a grain of salt, but it was still interesting to listen to ... and scary. I wanted to listen to the interview and happened to have my walkman (yes, I still have one - don't laugh). Big mistake. I couldn't make it past the produce before the static kicked in. I guess I now see why people eat up their data with iHeart.
 
Again, using the Brice road analogy, it was dying as the next exit down was beginning to thrive. New and shiney won out over tired and worn. And a changing demographic probably had some impact too.

The problem is Brice merchants didn't themselves become new and shiney. In a lot of instances they either remained tired and worn, moved down one exit or just threw in the towel. But if they wanted to, they could have made a make over. Too little too late. In some cases.

AM can't do a make over. AM stereo was a flop. As is AM HD. The metro population began outgrowing the restricted night signals and in some cases the day signals. Noise, ingress and crappy receivers also did their part. Other than standards, which now appears on life support in Columbus and most non Florida cities, it doesn't appear any music format can survive. (Even though I like some of the music WMNI plays, I'm now an undesirable demographic.)

WTVN was the anomaly. If you look at most cities, the strong AM retained high ratings. But by strong it meant either a 50kw blow torch or a less powerful but strong enough signal to compete. (I'll use WKRC in Cincy as an example as they cover the metro even with their restricted night signal). WTVN was severely pulled in from the west/southwest and from the east/southeast. I can't listen to WTVN in downtown Pic-town. It's nulled out. And there is ingress in Reynoldsburg. Anything east quickly dies. Same to the west, although the west doesn't have the population mass the east does. But even in Grove City by 665, WTVN is blighted by ingress. Even in areas off Stringtown, there is either a null or severe ingress.

I believe that an FM station that has fallen in the ratings can with program changes rise back to the top of the heap. I think if WTVN has really lost that many listeners, I doubt they can rebuild. Even if Bob returned.
 
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