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Dayton Ratings Embargo... Why?

G

Gregg

I don't understand why a third of the stations in the Dayton market aren't listed in the last several ratings books.

Why would an owner place a ratings embargo on his market's Arbitron results? Advertisers who have access to the ratings will know what the real results are, anyway.

Among the missing stations are WGTZ, WDHT, WONE, WING, WDAO, WPFB-FM, WGNZ and several religion stations. Only 3 Cincinnati stations make the Dayton ratings, while in years past, many more were included.


Gregg
[email protected]
 
The stations you mentioned are not Arbitron subscribers so they are not included in the ratings data the public gets. Mainline dropped them some time ago. Stations like WGNZ and WDAO really are too small to bear the expense. Not sure what the deal with WPFB is, may just be doing well enough with local direct.
 
Thanks for your help but there's something more going on here.

Adult Hits WGTZ, Fly 92.9, is usually in the top 10. You can't leave a major FM station in the Dayton market out of the Dayton ratings. According to the Dayton ratings, no sports station is listed, not ESPN outlet WING or Fox Sports WONE. Country WPFB-FM, Middletown, gets a one-share in the Cincinnati book. How could it not show up in the Dayton book?

50,000 watt Religion station WFCJ, Miamisburg, makes the Cincinnati ratings but not the Dayton ratings? Miamisburg is only a few miles from downtown Dayton.

37 stations make the Cincinnati ratings but only 14 are heard in Dayton? That makes no sense. Even Top 40 WNCI, Columbus, makes the Cincinnati ratings, from 100 miles away. But not the ratings in Dayton, 30 miles closer?


Gregg
[email protected]
 
It's not that these stations don't get ratings. They don't subscribe to Arbitron so their totals aren't being reported. Clear Channel still does, but WONE has spent years failing to crack a one share.
 
gr8oldies said:
It's not that these stations don't get ratings. They don't subscribe to Arbitron so their totals aren't being reported. Clear Channel still does, but WONE has spent years failing to crack a one share.
Click to expand...
In fact, the last time WONE/WIZE cracked a 1 share was when they were Adult Standards prior to the Sports flip in 2003...if I remember right they were doing well over a 3 share 12+. Sad to see these heritage signals doing such terrible ratings.
 
Gregg said:
Thanks for your help but there's something more going on here.

Adult Hits WGTZ, Fly 92.9, is usually in the top 10. You can't leave a major FM station in the Dayton market out of the Dayton ratings. According to the Dayton ratings, no sports station is listed, not ESPN outlet WING or Fox Sports WONE. Country WPFB-FM, Middletown, gets a one-share in the Cincinnati book. How could it not show up in the Dayton book?

50,000 watt Religion station WFCJ, Miamisburg, makes the Cincinnati ratings but not the Dayton ratings? Miamisburg is only a few miles from downtown Dayton.

37 stations make the Cincinnati ratings but only 14 are heard in Dayton? That makes no sense. Even Top 40 WNCI, Columbus, makes the Cincinnati ratings, from 100 miles away. But not the ratings in Dayton, 30 miles closer?


Gregg
[email protected]
Click to expand...

Gregg:

Nice conspiracy theory there. However, the facts are that a number of area ownerships do not buy the Arbitron book, therefore Arbitron embargos the market. If you are a subscriber to Arbitron, yes you get all of that information of which you speak.

Fly shows up in the book and gets numbers, other stations you mention such as WING-AM and WONE-AM do about what they've always done with small shares. WFCJ does a little better, of course, being FM. WPFB-FM is an also ran in Dayton as it has always been. I'd like to be able to elaborate, but I cannot as that information is privledged and belongs to Arbitron...

WLW still shows in the Dayton book, but not nearly the kinds of ratings points they used to show. WGRR and a couple of other Cincy stations have small numbers in the book, but no Cincinnati station is any kind of powerhouse in the Dayton ratings. They have no impact on Dayton listening.
 
OK, we understand why the unsubscribing stations don't show up in the Dayton ratings as displayed publicly on this web site. But one thing nobody has answered is why can one check the Cincinnati ratings and see numbers for WFCJ, WPFB-AM, and WPFB-FM?
 
keys2 said:
OK, we understand why the unsubscribing stations don't show up in the Dayton ratings as displayed publicly on this web site. But one thing nobody has answered is why can one check the Cincinnati ratings and see numbers for WFCJ, WPFB-AM, and WPFB-FM?
Click to expand...

I'll try and venture a guess for you. My guess would be that the Cincinnati book is not embargoed, and those numbers are for Cincinnati. The numbers belong to Arbitron and they can publish or not publish anything they want. They are under no obligation to make public any numbers they don't want to publish. You might try sending Arbitron an e-mail for a more exact explanation of their policies. I would imagine someone there would be willing to answer a reasonable inquiry.
 
One Who Knows said:
Gregg said:
Thanks for your help but there's something more going on here.

Adult Hits WGTZ, Fly 92.9, is usually in the top 10. You can't leave a major FM station in the Dayton market out of the Dayton ratings. According to the Dayton ratings, no sports station is listed, not ESPN outlet WING or Fox Sports WONE. Country WPFB-FM, Middletown, gets a one-share in the Cincinnati book. How could it not show up in the Dayton book?

50,000 watt Religion station WFCJ, Miamisburg, makes the Cincinnati ratings but not the Dayton ratings? Miamisburg is only a few miles from downtown Dayton.

37 stations make the Cincinnati ratings but only 14 are heard in Dayton? That makes no sense. Even Top 40 WNCI, Columbus, makes the Cincinnati ratings, from 100 miles away. But not the ratings in Dayton, 30 miles closer?


Gregg
[email protected]
Click to expand...

Gregg:

Nice conspiracy theory there. However, the facts are that a number of area ownerships do not buy the Arbitron book, therefore Arbitron embargos the market. If you are a subscriber to Arbitron, yes you get all of that information of which you speak.

Fly shows up in the book and gets numbers, other stations you mention such as WING-AM and WONE-AM do about what they've always done with small shares. WFCJ does a little better, of course, being FM. WPFB-FM is an also ran in Dayton as it has always been. I'd like to be able to elaborate, but I cannot as that information is privledged and belongs to Arbitron...

WLW still shows in the Dayton book, but not nearly the kinds of ratings points they used to show. WGRR and a couple of other Cincy stations have small numbers in the book, but no Cincinnati station is any kind of powerhouse in the Dayton ratings. They have no impact on Dayton listening.
Click to expand...
A few years back WLW was doing around a 3 in the Dayton book, usually right above or below the late Z-93.
 
Usually when a book is embargoed it's because non-subscribers were selling the numbers without paying for them. If this is the case in Dayton, it's unlikely those stations were trying to sell whatever incidental numbers they would have in the Cincy book.
 
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